A Sense of Resentment Amid the 'For Sale' Signs

In a press availability Saturday, standing alongside Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, Bush spoke to the concerns of "Main Street."

"You know, you hear them talking about Wall Street and Main Street -- well, this is Wall Street plus Main Street, and I'm worried about Main Street," he said. He recounted a conversation with Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. and other officials: "I said, what's it going to take to make sure Main Street doesn't get affected by the policies of Wall Street? And this is what they came up with, and this is a big ticket, because it's a big problem."

In Manassas Park and nearby communities in Prince William County, many people see the bailout as a violation of the basic rule that people and institutions must live within their means or face the consequences.

Kevin Newman, 42, knows how hard up people can get. He owns Ace Pawn, in a shopping center on Route 28 next to a newly vacant Checkers fast-food outlet. Newman spends his day lending money to people. He sees them at their most desperate. From a back room he pulls out a brand-new, sparkling Rickenbacker guitar that someone had gotten for his birthday and pawned just weeks later. His shop is filled with precious jewelry that people surrendered for cash. He had a customer -- he won't say who -- who pawned a Washington Redskins Super Bowl ring.

And Newman knows what it's like to be broke. He went bankrupt after a daughter was born prematurely and he faced $1 million in medical bills.

"I've been on both sides of the counter," he said.

Now, he never uses a credit card. If he can't pay for something out of his pocket, he won't buy it.

He instinctively doesn't like the bailout.

"I think our kids are going to be paying for it, and their kids are going to be paying for it, and probably their kids are going to be paying for it," he said.

Not far away, on Scott Drive, a side street off Manassas Drive, Charlie Crabill, 54, a landscaper, asks a common question in these parts: "Are they going to bail me out?" Crabill has benefited in one way from the mortgage meltdowns: He mows the lawns of about 70 houses in foreclosure, receiving a regular check from Fannie Mae.

Hours of interviews in Manassas Park turned up exactly one resident in favor of the bailout, a fellow in a Harvard T-shirt in a big house near the golf course. Richard Bejtlich, 36, who works in computer security for General Electric -- its stock jumped dramatically Friday when the government banned short-selling of financial securities -- says he's a libertarian and normally wouldn't support government intervention. But there's no other way at this point, he says, because we're in too deep of a hole and have been too profligate.

He recounts a conversation with a new neighbor who moved into a deluxe home:

"How did you afford that house?" Bejtlich asked.

"I don't know. I just signed," the neighbor said.

Prince William County is one of many ground zeros in the subprime mortgage crisis. Pick up a pamphlet on home sales in the county, and you will come across an ad saying "Foreclosures R Us!" Pictured are dozens of homes being sold for what seem like bargain-basement prices, some under $200,000. But there aren't many buyers -- because no one knows what anything is really worth, or whether the market is anywhere near bottom.

Exactly $180,000 -- about half the assessed value -- is what Paul Stinnett wants for his house, a Cape Cod under a 200-year-old white oak on Scott Drive. He's putting it on the market Monday. Painting the trim on the front door, Stinnett says of the bailout, "The last I heard it was going to cost the taxpayers a trillion dollars." He's not sure if the bailout's a good idea, but he does know the ultimate cause of the problem: "Greed. I think anybody can see that."

Ron Alphin, a home remodeler sitting on his porch and watching the Manassas Drive traffic roll by -- he's just a matter of feet outside the Manassas Park city line -- is flat-out against the bailout.

"The government got other problems they need to straighten out," he says. "They ain't going to help us a bit."

Jose Guzman, 18, says his Manassas Drive family has had personal experience with a disastrous mortgage. His mother, he says, snapped up a property down the street several years ago, only to be surprised when the mortgage proved adjustable, the interest rate rising so quickly that in two years the monthly payment went from $1,600 to $3,000. The bank foreclosed on that house.

Guzman points to a house for sale across the street.

"You know what they did? They actually just left, and let the bank take the house."

And this isn't even the hardest-hit part of the county. Woodbridge is worse, says Don Ratterree Jr., the real estate agent whose face and phone number can be found at the bottom of the "Foreclosures R Us" ads.

He puts the best spin on a bad situation: "It's a good buyer's market."