If my memory serves me right, the whole idea was dreamt up in the first place by people at Bank of America and actively pushed in Congress long before the collapse of autumn 2008, according to a story in the New York Times from early 2008. I'd better go find that.
Anyway, TARP was for the fat cats, if not of and by them, too. And so says banklawyersblog.com, here:
[I]t's galling that special action was taken at the highest levels to accommodate the fat cats, while providing any TARP for the little guys was at first an afterthought, and that now that many of the small banks took that capital, no one in Congress or the federal banking agencies is falling all over themselves to relax any rules (e.g., amortization of CRE losses) to help them [exit] before the dividend rates rise.
My new best friend.
