Bear Stearns ...why can't "market" bear and grin?

I am a bit (actually, more than a bit) amused by the Bearns Stearns issue and bailout. Here is the deal - if Bears Stearns is a failed company then so be it. Why should the tax payers bear the risk and JP Morgan walkaway with a great steal all in the name of national interests. Did Bear Stearns or other firms ask for government or tax payer permission before they gave away the nice bonuses? To be fair I don't think they even requested to be saved. JP Morgan and Wall Street suit types are funny - Bear Stearns deal was "fair" at $2 and then a few days later it was "fair" at $10. What is fair is to let Bear be - see if it can survive. If it dies, it was meant to be - greed did it in.

So, why does the government care now. And, is n't this and every other solution for the current crisis tackling the symptoms without addressing the root cause. I have seen a lot of this in India - usually for public sector (government owned) companies. There the reason was very clear - politicians need to win elections, to do so they need votes and these public sector undertaking represented nice large vote banks. While they may have also justified their actions as "protecting national interests" they never preached capitalism.