On Wall Street this morning, investors played it cautious as they held out for further news on the government's plan to buyout billions of dollars in bad mortgage debt.

Add to this a mix of corporate news: Microsoft says it plans to repurchase shares and Morgan Stanley says it's working with Japan's Mitsubishi financial group to sell up to a 20 percent stake in the company.

Eleven zeros, 700 billion dollars. Washington is bailing out Wall Street and taxpayers are picking up the bill.

"This is the mother of all bailouts and we don't see the end of it yet", said Sen. Richard Shelby of Alabama.

The Bush administration is urging Congress to quickly stabilize the financial system by temporarily transferring the bad debts of American financial institutions to taxpayers.

The current plan would give the Treasury Secretary sole power to manage the funds, buying and reselling mortgage debt. "This is something that has to work. I very much believe it will work", said Henry Paulson, Treasury Secretary.

With this, the combined bailouts would be in excess of one trillion dollars. More than double the entire cost of the Iraq War. "They're not holding those who are at the center of this thing, responsible for it", said Chris Thornberg, an economist with Beacon Economics.

Even though the taxpayer is being handed the bill - a bill where none of the funds will help out homeowners currently facing foreclosure.
"We need to put the taxpayer first ahead of bondholders, shareholders, Republicans argue that including a bailout for taxpayers would slow the current proposal down", said Sen. Charles Schumer of New York.

"We're going to jeopardize our economy, Americans' jobs and their savings", said Rep. John Boehner of Ohio.

One thing this 700 billion dollars is supposed to buy is more regulation. But the current proposal only requires one oversight report to Congress every 6 months.