Financiers have different concerns.  If the TARP seeks to buy assets too cheaply, banks will not take part. ~The Economist

This is the part of the argument where bailout supporters lose people, because this is where the apocalyptic rhetoric runs up against the possibility that financial institutions might turn down the offer that is supposedly the only thing between us and collapse.  When the vast majority of the public and a sizeable number of members of Congress balk at the bailout, they are told that there is no alternative and they simply must accept the deal, so how could it be that the financial institutions who stand to benefit from the bailout might reject it?  We are supposed to be on the verge of catastrophe, and presumably no one would be more aware of how close we are than these very institutions, but the government has to sweeten the pot enough to get the institutions to participate in the rescue?  Supporters of the bailout insist that we need to throw a lifeline to drowning banks, lest they pull all of us under with them, but we still have to give the banks enough of an incentive to grab on to the lifeline?  One might think that being offered rescue would be enough incentive.  If the consequences of rejecting the plan are as bad as the administration says, why would the plan’s primary beneficiaries not jump at the chance to have the government purchase these toxic assets?  If they wouldn’t jump at the chance, doesn’t that suggest that things may not be quite as bleak as we are being told?  Isn’t it then reasonable to ask why Congress and the public should be railroaded into accepting a deeply flawed plan?