Now that healtchare reform is done, the next big legislative item is finance reform. It seems Senator McConnell is out meeting with Wall Streeters and Big Bankers to make sure no real reform occurs. http://www.sanluisobispo.com/2010/04/18/1107199/mcconnells-comments-on-financial.html And it appears they are going to use the Luntz playbook again. The strategy failed to work for them in healthcare reform, so why not do the same old thing over again. Was it not Einstien who said the definition of insanity was to do the same thing over again and expect a different result. Well if that is the case it must mean the Republcian leadership is insane. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! However, there may be some light. There is some rumblings that individual Republcans are not quite as insane as their leadership, and might want to do things a little differently this time around. Certianly the SEC's announcement that they are suing Goldman Sachs shot a big hole in McConnell's claim a day earlier that the Obama administration and the Democrats wanted to go easy on Wall Street.
Toxic Mitch? Paul Krugman advises: Well, Mr. McConnell is trying. His talking points come straight out of a memo Frank Luntz, the Republican political consultant, circulated in January on how to oppose financial reform. "Frankly," wrote Mr. Luntz, "the single best way to kill any legislation is to link it to the Big Bank Bailout." And Mr. McConnell is following those stage directions. It's a truly shameless performance: Mr. McConnell is pretending to stand up for taxpayers against Wall Street while in fact doing just the opposite. In recent weeks, he and other Republican leaders have held meetings with Wall Street executives and lobbyists, in which the G.O.P. and the financial industry have sought to coordinate their political strategy. And let me assure you, Wall Street isn't lobbying to prevent future bank bailouts. If anything, it's trying to ensure that there will be more bailouts. By depriving regulators of the tools they need to seize failing financial firms, financial lobbyists increase the chances that when the next crisis strikes, taxpayers will end up paying a ransom to stockholders and executives as the price of avoiding collapse. Even more important, however, the financial industry wants to avoid serious regulation; it wants to be left free to engage in the same behavior that created this crisis. It's worth remembering that between the 1930s and the 1980s, there weren't any really big financial bailouts, because strong regulation kept most banks out of trouble. It was only with Reagan-era deregulation that big bank disasters re-emerged .... .... So don't be fooled. When Mitch McConnell denounces big bank bailouts, what he's really trying to do is give the bankers everything they want. I think it would be interesting if McConnell has finally overplayed his hand. The Democrats have been rather quite slow to catch on. Or maybe they just couldn't figure out how to respond. Either way, we might look to the Senate Republicans and wonder how long it takes them to figure out that McConnell's rabid oppositional strategy might be failing. Are they going to play this one all the way to November? ____________________ Notes: Krugman, Paul. "The Fire Next Time". The New York Times. April 16, 2010; page A27. NYTimes.com. April 18, 2010. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/16/opinion/16krugman.html Hulse, Carl and Adam Nagourney. "Senate G.O.P. Leader Finds Weapon in Unity". The New York Times. March 17, 2010; page A13. NYTimes.com. April 18, 2010. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/17/us/politics/17mcconnell.html
Yeah real one track, I love you too. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! Republican leadership is trying to use the same game plan for finance reform as they used for healthcare reform. And oddly enough, that game plan preceeded the drafting of the bills. One would think, assuming no ESP, that if one were serious about working for the American people Republicans would work with Democrats to create an acceptable bill rather than working to defeat it before it actually exists. http://www.sltrib.com/opinion/ci_14900368
It will be interesting Tiassa to see how things play out. But it is clear, by McConnell's remarks that he intends to use the Luntz play book again, which was written before the current reform legislation had even been drafted. It was a pleasure to see the administrations law suit against Goldman Sachs come out the day after McConnell made his remarks and the resulting havoc on Wall Street. The Obama administration quite clearly demonstrated their intent and which side they are on with that single action. I cannot help but wonder if McConnell was suffering from a sore jaw on Friday. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! It will be even more interesting to see if his merry band of Republicans continue to follow his game plan.
maybe us canadians will allow it, and or the chinese, i mean canada owns alot of your financial institutes now and china owns most of your money so, i think yall better ask permission first. don't blame the messanger blame the bush family.
Sen. Corker may be the key to GOP cooperation Watch Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN), who tried working with Banking Committee Chairman Sen. Dodd. Although Corker's effort didn't pan out the way he'd hoped, he said last month of Dodd's bill that it had a ninety percent chance of passing the full Senate. "I think it's probably true," said Corker, "that we have a better opportunity with a different cast of characters—the full Senate—to do something that is sound, policy-wise." Whether or not he will try, on the one hand, to break McConnell's line, or can succeed, to the other, have yet to be seen. ____________________ Notes: Postal, Arthur D. "Financial Services Bill Heads To Senate Floor". National Underwriter Life & Health. March 23, 2010. LifeAndHealthInsuranceNews.com. April 19, 2010. http://www.lifeandhealthinsurancene...cial-Services-Bill-Heads-To-Senate-Floor.aspx
Republicans are in a bit of a pickel with finance reform. If they fight the bill, the run the risk of getting a lot of egg on their face and looking silly before the electorate - including their base this fall. If they cave in to the Democrats, they disappoint their financial backers (Wall Street & Banks). Republicans are walking a very fine line. The lies they promulgated about healthcare reform are going to pale by comparision to the lies they must create about the financial reform bills which are now before Congress in order to thwart passage of a financial reform bill.
The only reason the Dems were able to pass healthcare 'reform" was that they had a temporary super majority. Once they lost that, they used parliamentary tricks to ram it thru without having to face another vote in the Senate. From now until November, they'll need to hold every Democrat and pick up at least one Republican to pass anything controversial. After November, the Democrats may well come to have a new appreciation for the filibuster.Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! As to the topic of financial reform, even I don't think you should be allowed to sell CDO's you've designed specifically to fail and then make money by selling them short. That should be considered fraud. It's like a professional athlete betting against his own team and then throwing the game.
Ram it through Congress...interesting. The bill was passed in the Senate with a super majority as you point out, and then passed in the house. I believe that is is (less the super majority) is how all bills become law. So I fail to see how that consitutes a parliamentary trick. And a an additional bill was passed by the Senate with a simple majority vote and passed the House with a simple majority vote. Again, that is according to the Constitution, how Congress is supposed to make law. How does that qualify as a parliamentary trick? There was no trickery, every thing was passed according to law and validated by the Senate parliamentarian...who was appointed by Republicans. Scott Brown, that new Tea Party senator all the Republicans were all excited about, has already jumped ship and broken from Republican Party line to vote with Democrats and pass the unemployment extension bill and break one of those famous Republican filibusters. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! And now it looks like Republicans are quite willing to feed their Wall Street financial backers to wolves. Frankly, I hope the Republicans don't break from their leadership and make a stink out of Financial Reform and defend their Wall Street masters. It will be a great issue for the Democrats this fall. But I just don't think the Republcian foot soldiers in Congress are as dumb as their leaders. So I think there will be a bipartisan reform bill rather quickly. Then Republican leadership will have to worry that his might become more than a one off affair...that there might be more cooperation on other issues.
We need huge reform in the financial industry, Joe. I think we can agree on that. But more Fed Reserve involvement and more bureaucracy is definitely not what we need. Back in the good old days, banks had to rely on hard cash deposits in order to lend money and even then, that was if people wanted the bank to lend their money (if they agreed and put it in a high-interest account). The Federal Reserve's policies on fractional reserve banking create irresponsibility and credit crashes.
We agree we do need financial reform. But it is not the Fed that is the problem. The banking system has worked well for almost a century with the Fed. It wasn't until a Republican Congress reversed Glass-Stegal and the creation of the runaway unregulated derivative markets that we got in trouble. In my opinion we need to go back to Glass-Stegal but there appears to be little appetite for that in both parties. But at the very least, we need visibility/transparency into the derivatives markets and someone needs to be minding the derivative shop...making sure that relevant facts are known to buyers and sellers of derivatives (no monkey business).
