There was an article buried in our local paper recently. It said that since discovering there was no surplus, the government had to borrow money to send out the "rebate" checks. From what I understand, this means the government had to buy bonds. This also means that taxpayers will have to pay plus interest for these bonds, nullifying anything we just received. The only winners are those that sell these bonds to the government, who happen to be the same (wealthy) people that invested in Bush's presidency.