In point of fact, I'm not in favor of the "bailout" either. Wallstreet got us into this mess, I say let them sink. Same goes for GM. They bought up and dismantled a lot of public transportation after WWII, it'd be poetic justice to nationalize them (at the expense of the shareholders) and use their workers and facilities to build public transportation.

On the topic of public works however, I see that as a totally different topic. You may not use parks, libraries, schools or museums either, but others do. Their impact on society is a constructive one. Open source is along that vein. And if you don't think you use open source, think twice. The webserver you're on is powered perhaps entirely by open source and the open standards built around it. The routers you use to connect to this server are almost all either running open source directly, or are based on some descendant of FreeBSD which is open source. Without OSS, the internet as you know it would simply not exist.

So when they throw money at banks and big industry, it's good. When they throw money at something that can potentially benefit everyone, it's bad? I don't get it.

To me, open source is a resource. The more of it we have, the more competitive we can be. Not just in the IT sector, but everybody who uses computers as part of their business process. It's like building a park or a library. Sure a few people make their living off of the implementation and upkeep of those resources, but the important part is the resource itself. It contributes in a much larger way than the salaries of those commissioned to work on them.