Finally

Somebody notices that Paulson has the authority to nationalize the banks — stock injection — and that he may actually be planning on doing it.
From Krugman:

Update:Starting already? Justin Fox catches something in Paulson’s press conference today:

Did anybody else notice that when Hank Paulson was describing in his press conference today what the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act enables Treasury to do, the first thing he listed was “to inject capital into financial institutions”?

That wasn’t how Treasury initially advertised its Troubled Asset Relief Program. It was sold as a way to get the market for mortgage securities moving (or, to use the jargon, liquid). Lots of academic economists objected that liquidity wasn’t the problem, it was insolvency. What Treasury needed to do was recapitalize financial institutions and take equity stakes in return.

…

None of the people asking questions at the press conference really seemed to pick up on this, of course (&%%$# Washington journalists!). Along with Paulson’s affirmation that the FDIC was going to use its “systemic risk” powers to protect depositors and unsecured creditors “as appropriate,” I take it as one more sign that we’re headed toward a Swedish solution of our banking crisis—recapitalization and temporary nationalization of much of the banking system.

Fox claims he first reported this Sept. 28, but that was before the bill was approved. I still say the guys at NPR had it first.

OK, I owe one to Justin Fox at Time and now need to add him to my daily reads because he actually responded to me twice. So, here he's getting the timing on the whole real bailout plan. Will this see the light of day outside of the 'sphere. Your guess is as good as mine. I'm saying I smell stealth operation here.

P.S. I had been reading Time mag since I was 9 years old but swore off when they hired Mr. Smirky, Mark Halperin, and pooh-poohed the AG scandal. Maybe Fox will turn me around.