It seems like eons ago, but it was really barely a year ago that Rahm Emmanuel said that you should never let a crisis go to waste.
Well, the Democrats, pushed relentlessly by Emmanuel, by the way, have done just that. The latest proof of that, if any was needed, is the stark contrast between Franklin Roosevelt’s reaction to the Depression and Obama’s reaction to the current (unacknowledged) Depression. Roosevelt enacted real financial reform that prevented economic catastrophe for more than 60 years, until those protections were eroded during the nineties, and our economic fortunes were handed over to the banks and the speculators.
Now we have the sorry spectacle of the Democrats being unable or unwilling to enact true financial reform, with our soon to be departed Senator leading the cave in. A few months ago Obama said an independent consumer protection agency was critical to financial reform, but Dodd (and you can bet that Obama is cheering him on) has compromised with himself and proposed that the agency be captive to the banks within the Federal Reserve. If the bill is enacted some lucky bureaucrat is going to get a nice sinecure, since s/he will only have to come to work every day and do nothing, because that’s all s/he’ll be allowed to do.
The amazing thing about this is that all of these compromises will still not get one Republican vote.
Oh, alright, I’m joking. The amazing thing is that Dodd really seems to think it might get one Republican vote. No, I’m joking again. Dodd can’t possibly be so stupid as to actually believe that the Republicans will change their behavior when the Democrats are playing right into their hands.
No, the truly amazing thing is that the Democrats fail to see that this could be the issue that revives their flagging electoral prospects if they would only propose something really effective, and really popular, and actually fight for it, and make the Republicans fight against it. Only the Democrats could refuse to do somethign that is both politically popular and right, in order to pursue the phantom of “bipartisanship”.
Lest you think there is no urgency to doing something, consider this:
… Fifteen years ago, the combined assets of our six biggest banks totaled 17 percent of our GDP. By 2006, that number was 55 percent. Right now, it stands at 63 percent.
They own us, and they own the Congress, and they are insisting that they have the right to screw us all again if the price of giving up that right is giving up their bonuses.
One might wonder why the Democrats are playing nice with the banks, when doing so might cost them their jobs. Perhaps it’s because they know that there are even better jobs waiting for them should they need them:
One of the first senior-level officials to leave the Obama Treasury Department is headed to The Cypress Group, a financial services lobbying and consulting firm based in Washington, D.C. Damon Munchus, who served as the Deputy Assistant Secretary for Banking and Finance in Treasury’s Office of Legislative Affairs, will open the firm’s New York office as a Managing Director. The Cypress Group will also open an office in Dallas headed by Managing Director Jeb Mason, who served as the as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Business Affairs under Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. With these additions, The Cypress Group now employs former senior-level advisors to the past three Secretaries of the Treasury as well as Secretary Geithner.
…
Munchus worked in the Office of Legislative Affairs, which deals directly with the Hill. His position as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Banking and Finance gave him intimate knowledge not just of the process but of key lawmakers — what they privately support what they secretly need; what they detest; and what makes them tick.
That’s invaluable information to investors. Munchus couldn’t be reached for comment.
We are so fucked.
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