This was monstrous, er … monumental legislation given all the due diligence of a typical tax return.

The brightest minds in the land (or the ones who tell you they are the brightest) spent almost no time considering other options.

They might even be right — it does happen.

For all that both political parties found this bailout distasteful, President Bush, both presidential candidates and the leadership of both parties backed it.

That should be reason enough to question it.

When a friend of yours tells you to get out of the middle of the street because a car is coming, you listen.

When Washington hack politicians like Rep. Barney Frank, D-Fannie Mae, tell you bailing out the housing sector is a good thing, maybe we ought to think twice.

Frank, after all, was the same guy who memorably claimed that problems at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were “exaggerated” all the way back in 2003.

“These two entities — Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac — are not facing any kind of financial crisis,” Frank said to The New York Times.

He was just a little wrong.

But there’s little point to pointing fingers.

I could write a column just as easily blasting stupid lending practices on Wall Street or the Bush administration’s carefree and careless spending attitudes that aided this problem.

The bigger question is now what?

First off, we the taxpayers pay — and I mean pay big-time.

You think Congress can spend $700 billion for a bailout, lard it up with more than $100 billion more in bribes for votes and we get off without paying?

Not a chance.

The folks in Washington can pile on taxes that make Gov. O’Malley look like an amateur.

Next, get used to paying, because a lot of smart people think this isn’t the end.

Are we even close?

Further problems loom in the real estate market from something called option ARMs that allow home buyers to pay whatever they want on a loan until a set time.

That extra cash gets rolled into the total amount owed.

In other words, it’s typically a stupid loan for people who shouldn’t be buying houses in the first place.

There’s more.

One of the biggest problems is lost confidence.

Americans are becoming a bit cautious about spending, investing, banking and anything that doesn’t involve hiding cash in the mattress.

Somehow we are skeptical about giving $800 billion to the people who caused the problem in the first place.

Perhaps it’s bad marketing.

Maybe the government should give us all free T-shirts as part of an image campaign.

Maybe a nice slogan would help: “An $810 billion bailout and all I got was this lousy T-shirt.”

Only you didn’t get the shirt.

A bunch of folks on Wall Street and a bunch of folks in D.C. got the one off your back.

Dan Gainor can be seen on the new Fox Business Network. He is T. Boone Pickens Fellow at the Media Research Center’s Business & Media Institute, a career journalist and media commentator. He can be reached at [email protected].