With the Senate having revived the banking system bailout/rescue plan, today the House is to decide whether the plan can breathe on its own -- and be put to work on shoring up a teetering financial system. The vote here is that the plan should be given that chance.

Granted, this is, as congresspeople are given to saying, no easy vote. And it has not been made easier by the larding on, in the Senate, of special-interest provisions that are intended, charitably speaking, to perk up the economy or -- cynically -- to pick up stray votes.

That in fact both motives are in play does not alter the overall situation. Quick action indeed is needed to prevent more financial-institution failures, to free up credit and to restore confidence.

Sure, the bill before the House isn't perfect. Other approaches to a rescue strategy might work as well, or as poorly. But the bill on the table gets close to the heart of the problem. It authorizes the Treasury to use hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars to buy up at auction and hold (for later resale) hard-to-value mortgage-based securities foolishly bought by too many financial institutions. It has a reasonable chance of restoring the credit system to health, and of eventually getting back most if not all of the money, as the Resolution Trust Corp. did after the savings and loan crisis 20 year ago.

There are some useful provisions in the bill, including measures to prevent foreclosures, curtail excessive executive pay and increase the level of FDIC insurance on Americans' bank accounts.

Yes, there are annoyingly narrow tax-related provisions as well -- help for struggling makers of wooden arrows, anyone? -- along with broader tax relief. But the big picture remains the same: the country, and indeed the world, needs action and this bill offers it. For all the talk-radio talk, for all the single-cause scapegoating and instant accounting expertise, no plan from the political right, or the left, is likely to attract enough votes to pass both houses of Congress.

In that regard, the Senate vote Wednesday night, 74 in favor, 25 against, was illuminating.

Here were senators of solid conservative credentials -- Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Tom Coburn of Oklahoma, Winston-Salem's Richard Burr -- lining up with President Bush and the Senate's Democratic leaders. And with John McCain and Barack Obama, one of whom will have to preside over the fallout from the bailout, good or ill. All supported the bill.

Missing from the pro-plan lineup was Elizabeth Dole. The first-term North Carolina Republican, in the midst of what's said to be a tight re-election campaign, says she prefers a free-market solution, not a government bailout. (Her Democratic opponent, Kay Hagan, says she'd have voted "no" as well.) Dole's stand plays well with an upset public -- but leaves the impression she thinks her party's presidential candidate is wrong about the biggest issue to face Congress in years.

Earlier in the week, North Carolina Democratic Reps. David Price, Bob Etheridge, Brad Miller and Mel Watt showed good judgment and some courage in a losing cause by supporting the initial bill. Now that the Senate has given the plan new life, they and other representatives should vote to put it into action.

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