Robert Reich: Who's Killing Financial Reform?

[tonysam]

Senator Chris Dodd, the chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, scolded Wall Street representatives at a hearing Thursday for sending “an army of lobbyists whose only mission is to kill the common-sense financial reforms” needed by the public. “The fact is,” Dodd said, “I am frustrated, and so are the American people.” He charged that Wall Street’s intransigence was the reason for Congress’s failure to pass any bill to regulate the Street. “The refusal of large financial firms to work constructively with Congress on this effort borders on insulting to the American people who have lost so much in this crisis.”

In other words, it isn’t Congress’s fault. It isn’t the Senate Banking Committee’s fault. It certainly isn’t Dodd’s fault. The reason more than a year has passed since the biggest bailout in the history of the world and nothing has been done to prevent a repeat performance — even as the biggest banks are doling out more than $30 billion of bonuses, even as Goldman Sachs is awarding its big traders $16 billion in bonuses (more than the $13 billion Goldman collected from taxpayers via the bailout of AIG), even as AIG itself is handing out bonuses — the reason is … what, exactly, Senator? Because the Street has sent an army of lobbyists to Capitol Hill?

Call me old fashioned, but I thought Congress was in charge of passing legislation, not Wall Street.

Dodd left out the most telling detail, of course. Wall Street is where the campaign money is. Dodd of all people knows that. He’s been on the receiving end of lots of it over the years.

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[Demeter]

1. Let's Give Chris Dodd a Real Retirement Send-Off

and ride him out of DC on a rail, in a brand new tar-and-feathers suit by Armani.

[bertman]

2. Same old shit. I was a fan of Dodd's until this bailout crap started.

Judging from this commentary, we will be seeing lots of Republican candidates getting the campaign goodies this cycle and 2012. So, the Dems have to suck up and be nice IF they want to get their share of the loot.

We are screwn.

[bvar22]

3. More drama for the TV Cameras.

Everybody KNOWS that the time to impose regulation is BEFORE handing over the money.

All the posturing in front of the TV cameras, crying and blaming, IS simply Kabuki Theater for the fools back home.

[MrsCorleone]

4. The dolts on RW radio have been ramping up the "kill financial reform!" rhetoric.

Their freeper/teabagger listeners must be so confused, per usual.

[midnight]

5. And Dodd was connected with the health bill.

Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., who ushered the overhaul legislation through the Senate's health committee last year after the death of his friend, Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, said Obama and lawmakers could "maybe take a breather for a month, six weeks."http://www.startribune.com/politics/national/congress/82393507.html?elr=KArks8c7PaP3E77K_3c::D3aDhUUUUr

[LongTomH]

6. There's a great paragraph down further in the article:

Some Democrats are quietly grumbling that all the tough talk emanating from the White House in recent weeks — the President calling the Street’s denizens “fat cats” and threatening them with limits on their size and the risks they can take, even waiving a watered-down version of Glass-Steagall in their faces — is making it harder to collect money from the Street this mid-term election year. And the Street is quietly threatening that it may well give Republicans more, if the saber-rattling doesn’t stop.

[Uncle Joe]

7. I believe Reich's summation nails it.

"Congress isn’t doing a thing about Wall Street because it’s in the pocket of Wall Street. Dodd’s outburst at the Street is like the alcoholic who screams at a bartender “how dare you give me another drink when all I’ve done is pleaded with you for one!”

Dodd is right about one thing. The American people are frustrated, and the failure of Congress to pass real financial reform is insulting. But in trying to place responsibility for this appalling failure on Wall Street, Dodd insults us even more."

Thanks for the thread, tonysam

[yurbud]

8. yep, why would re-regulation require Wall Street's COOPERATION? If it's the right kind...

of regulation, they should resist it kicking an screaming.