With Dodd-Frank Rollback, The Big Bad Banks Are Back

[MachineGhost]

I didn't see any discussion about this backroom deal.  It has since sparked a grassroots uprising, especially for a "21st Century Glass-Steagall Act".

Around nine o’clock last night, the House passed a massive $1.1 trillion spending plan. This action averted a government shutdown—a good thing. Less good was the fact that the bill also contained a provision, said to be written by Citigroup, repealing a key part of the Dodd-Frank Act.

The provision enables the big banks once again to use insured deposits and other taxpayer subsidies and guarantees to gamble in the derivatives markets—the very type of business that drove the 2008 financial crisis and the economic devastation that followed.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/stevedennin ... -are-back/

[Pointedstick]

This is the most insane part, although the whole thing is crazy. I don't remember electing Citibank to congress; why are they writing laws? 

They paid good money for those laws.

[MachineGhost]

There is one small, hollow victory...  Wall Street didn't succeed in eviscerating the new "fiduciary duty" rules where all retirement investment advisors would have to put the interests of their clients first.

[Ad Orientem]

Banks are the enemy. If it's too big to fail and too big to jail, it needs to be broken up. It's as if the government has forgotten one of it's favorite constitutional powers, so often abused, the authority to regulate interstate commerce. This is a crystal clear case where anti-trust and monopoly laws should be rigorously applied.

[moda0306]

Banks are the enemy. If it's too big to fail and too big to jail, it needs to be broken up. It's as if the government has forgotten one of it's favorite constitutional powers, so often abused, the authority to regulate interstate commerce. This is a crystal clear case where anti-trust and monopoly laws should be rigorously applied.

Yup. We need Teddy back.

[moda0306]

Banks are the enemy. If it's too big to fail and too big to jail, it needs to be broken up. It's as if the government has forgotten one of it's favorite constitutional powers, so often abused, the authority to regulate interstate commerce. This is a crystal clear case where anti-trust and monopoly laws should be rigorously applied.

Yup. We need Teddy back.

Roosevelt.

Perhaps I'm not understanding some humor here.

Teddy Bush or Teddy Clinton?

[moda0306]

Ah I get it!

Good one. I'm a bit slow on the uptake sometimes.

[WiseOne]

This is the most insane part, although the whole thing is crazy. I don't remember electing Citibank to congress; why are they writing laws? 

They paid good money for those laws.

Thanks to campaign finance law "free speech" protection.  Good old Scalia & Thomas....

Don't forget to keep up with the gold and bonds.  Looks like we'll be revisiting 2008 in another few years.

[MachineGhost]

Thanks to campaign finance law "free speech" protection.  Good old Scalia & Thomas....

That's a common liberal sentiment, but campaign finance and direct lobbying are completely different beasts.  Free speech is never harmful, but having a bureaucrat decide what is and what is not free speech certainly is.  Direct lobbying on the other hand...

[WiseOne]

And you don't think that campaign contributions from Citibank to the members of Congress who inserted the text had anything to do with this?  (Note - it would take a significant research effort to uncover that info, but there have been plenty of examples of this in the past.)