In 2008 the banks almost collapsed the American economy when they took our money and gambled it away at the Wall Street casino trading derivatives. As part of the recovery Congress passed laws to prevent the banks from doing the same thing again. Now Citibank slipped a law into the budget package that allows banks to do it again.
Banks can now gamble with our deposits, our savings, our pensions, and if they lose the taxpayer is stuck with the bill. And this time they just legalized the stealing. America, as a nation, is on the verge of committing suicide. And we have to do this so members of Congress can be home for Christmas. Where is the outrage? Only Elizabeth Warren can save us now.
I’ll bet Hillary would side with the banks.
That’s a safe bet.
I wonder if Elizabeth Warren and Hillary Clinton support Obama’s plan to put tariffs on Chinese solar cells? I joked about it years ago on this site, and now liberals are actually doing it.
Yup, were going back to letting wallstreet and the banks make risky their bets. And when the losses come the American public will be told if the losers aren’t bailed out the whole financial system will collapse. This should not have been included in the budget package. The deregulation section should have been a separate bill, and voted on so congress could read and decide on the slashing of the Dodd Frank. The bankers are at it again, here comes another bubble.
Really? You’re hoping for some change, are you? Haven’t you noticed that D/R votes go for maintaining the status quo? What I’ve noticed is that ALL campaign speeches are lies to get your vote, that grass roots grow in the same dirt as party roots and take on the same flavor after polls close and we the people are dealt with as adversaries of our republic.
er …. it was snarky sarcasm. But never mind.
i’d say this is exactly why we need to give POTUS the authority for line-item vetoes, but who am i kidding? Obama doesn’t have the testicular fortitude to stand up to his corporate backers.
Possibly not, nevertheless the LIV would help combat some of this.
Obama WANTS to pass it.
This is not the only thing sneaked into the “must pass” bill. Quite a few other were included, and most of them go unnoticed to all except those looking for their own little perk/favor.
I believe this is exactly what Congress wants. Fifty weeks of talking past each other, agreeing on nothing but naming post offices, and then two weeks of hidden back-room deals that nobody has to take the credit/blame for. And then President Obama and Speaker of the House John Boehner each twist arms to pass this amalgamation of crap, because not passing it would be “worse”.
I’m afraid you’re right.
Agreed. One of the major reforms required is that a bill or proposed legislation must address a single topic. Period.
How do we make this palatable? Institute a MONTHLY PORK BILL. Call it that. Truth in labeling. Each state is allowed 4 (or whatever) inclusions in the MONTHLY PORK BILL, not to exceed their portion of the budget for that month’s bill based on that states proportionate population.
So (for example) if Rhode Island was going to get a new military base, that has to be outside of the MONTHLY PORK BILL as stand alone legislation because the cost would be over their proportionate budget of the MONTHLY PORK BILL.
The only reason they don’t have to take the blame for it is because voters never have the balls to hold them accountable. They almost always vote for the candidate with the most money (in the form of corporate bribes), and nobody seems to give a rat’s ass with respect to how this is destroying the democratic process.
If they keep playing with the logic of Economics LETS add a rule..
1. Banks must hold the loans they created..NOT selling them to others. or even PARTS of the loan.
2. if a Bank DIES, so do the loans it created..
If we are playing games, LETS PLAY A GAME..
Well why not just restore Glass–Steagall? I mean, who would be able to introduce this, let alone the law that actually protected us for decades?
I couldn’t agree more. Glass-Steagall would bring back normal banking, no more shenanigans by bankers. We have Clinton to blame for signing the bill that was put forth by three republicans that allowed the banks to turn into anything but a bank. Now Dodd-Frank has been pushed to the side so the rich can get richer with risky financial bets. Why not add casinos inside the banks?
Casinos inside banks? Isn’t that pretty much what derivatives trading amounts to? And what true casino enjoys Federal insurance while the banks do.
“Only Elizabeth Warren can save us now.”
Riiiiight. Marc, your faith in politicians deserves as much ridicule as what you heap on the religious.
I mean by doing a filibuster.
You’re not allowed to filibuster a reconciliation bill.
Mark, you have already established that it is treason to vote no.
So why are you advocating for Elizabeth Warren to commit treason?
Just because I say one thing and do another does that make me a hypocrite?
No. It makes you Windows 7.
“And we have to do this ”
Joe Scarborough and a Democratic Congressman on MSNBC, back when Joe was still in Congress.
D:This budget is terrible.
some back and forth with Joe
Moderator to D”Why did you vote for the budget.”
D:blather
Joe gets excited,”He voted for it!”
D”I didn’t have a choice!”
Joe:”Vote NO”
“And we have to do this so members of Congress can be home for Christmas”
You mean because Harry Reid didn’t want his members to go on record voting for deficits, so he ignored Senate rules and just didn’t pass a budget. Where are the appropriations bills they were supposed to pass? And where was the outrage?
Banks are not uniquely qualified to run the empire?
What is this deposit everyone speaks of? I better call Coustomer service.
Congress “decided to allow” the banks to steal again.
Congress “decided to allow” the CIA do the torture again.
You and I decided to allow these things. Congress is not much more than the reflection and the voice of people.
They allow because we allow.
We allow shit. Now we eat shit. What did you think would happen?
Mr. Moderator please: I tried to insert an image. Do you block the insertion of images? If so, that’s cool or not. Need to know so I don’t try again a different way.
WHY THE FUCK IS ANYONE STILL PUTTING MONEY >>>IN<<< THESE LAW PERVERTING BANKS?! YOU'RE A GODDAMNED IDIOT!!!
TRY USING A CREDIT UNION!
If you’re not “banking” at a credit union then you’re only a small part of the problem. So stop your complaining!
Can we stop calling Democrats commie liberals now? Except for Elizabeth Warren, of course. Since she does stand up for the average citizen instead of big corporations, you wingnuts feel free to insult her as much as you want. 🙂
Knock yourselves out! 😀
Commies are built around catering to the wealthy. It is about inequality of power.
Affirmative action baby gives a demagogic speech while cashing in on the side. Where have we seen that before? At least Obama was a real minority.
This is the problem with wingnut “conservatives”. They get whipped into a frenzy when they find out some schmuck has defrauded the food stamp program out of a hundred dollars. But when Wall Street defrauds the American taxpayers (hint: you too, wingnuts) out of hundreds of billions of dollars, wingnuts just shrug their shoulders, meh.
What is wrong with you people? You like being ripped off by rich people?
Anyone? Bueller?
Oh well, on to the next penny-ante “scandal” while the rich rip off billions from us.
The mind of a wingnut is a strange thing…
You see, Republicans are incapable of doing wrong, since they are after all Republicans. If they do it, it must be legal (see R. M. Nixon). And if they did somehow do something wrong, it’s OK because they’re doing it for the right reasons to “those people”.
No, people who voted for TARP were being targeted for it in primaries.
Even then, the bailout is oversold. When it failed to pass on the first day, the stock market went up. It also went up when they let Lehman Bros fold. Bigger thing was Goldman Sachs getting lots of goodies for themselves.
Banks that didn’t want the bailout were forced to accept it. One major bank, did not want the money and did not need it, chairman was told he was not leaving the room until he agreed to the bailout.
Even the ones that needed it, wasn’t much of a bailout. There was lots of emergency lending to prevent runs on banks, and AIG was made good, and even they repaid.
If you’re looking for Elizabeth Warren to save you, you’re looking at the wrong person.
1. Why must “conservatives” speak of politics in such black and white terms? No politician can “save” us. They can work to make things better, or they can work to make things worse. Generally, we prefer to support politicians who make things better.
2. Stripping away the black and white thinking, what’s wrong with what Elizabeth Warren is doing? Looks like she’s looking out for the average citizen, not Wall Street. Is that not something conservatives like?
Why do you assume I am a conservative? I was making the same point you did – politicians are not the ones to “save” anyone.
Elizabeth Warren is not moving to put bankers who defrauded people in jail. She’s looking for more regulation – which will cause more problems in the future, especially since regulation is usually left to bureaucrats to write, and those bureaucrats came from the industries that are to be regulated. She’s not looking out for the average citizen – she’s looking to make herself look good while doing nothing.
I assume you’re a conservative because of your knee-jerk reaction that regulation is bad. Glass-Steagall regulation was good, they got rid of it and we had a financial crash. Yes, regulations written by the industries being regulated is bad. That doesn’t mean we throw out regulation, that’s what the industries want! It means we write real regulations that actually keep them honest.
Those nice people on Wall Street (brace yourself) don’t always do the most honest things if they’re not being watched.
And I’m very impressed by your intimate knowledge of Elizabeth Warren’s inner motivations. You must have some kind of super powers to be able to read her mind like that.
(She didn’t come from Wall Street, BTW.)
When a robber steals money or property from someone. They also steal time. The time it took to earn that money. Or the time it will take to regain it, if the theft is not recovered. So the thieves are punished in kind. By having some of their time taken from them. In terms of a prison sentence.
The banks and Wall Street traders who steal inventor’s money, are also stealing time. But we don’t seem to see any of them being punished, the same way common thieves are. They lose no time at all. They get no jail terms. And any fines their company must pay, is just pasted onto their stockholders. And who pays for the bailouts. The taxpayers. So basically the Govt, also steals a bit more of everyone’s precious time. To try and undo the theft of a smaller number of people, who lost some time.
The thing is, they can keep printing all the worthless currency they need, to compensate for the losses. But they can’t create more time. Once it’s gone, it’s gone.
I’m afraid that even when we condemn their policies they are very well insulated and nothing is going to happen. The banking industry belongs to or reports to a very few individuals that move the strings of global economy and governments. Wall Street directors are not only criminal, but perverse. The US Governments supposedly fights against terrorism, yet on 1999 the chairman of the New York Stock Exchange, Richard Grasso, traveled to Colombia to meet with the leaders of the FARC guerrilla, enticing them to place their 2 billion dollars obtained by kidnapping and drug trafficking in Wall Street. Is that not aiding terrorism? Yet everyone turned a blind eye to the prospect.
Horatio
http://www.rtwwheels.com/