Around the Web: On to Financial Reform

With the Obama administration and the Democratic leadership declaring historic victory on health care reform, the next big item could be fixing the troubled banking system.

It could make the battle over health care look like a walk in the park. The financial industry, Republicans and Blue Dog Democrats are all lined up to kill or weaken it.

They’ve already succeeded in getting Sen. Chris Dodd to weaken his reform proposal, which the Senate Banking Committee passed Monday on a 13 to 10 party line vote. Here’s the Atlantic’s take, including what Dodd had to say Monday.

Getting Dodd to soften his stance probably wasn’t that tough. He’s traditionally a staunch ally of Wall Street and only took a strong stance when it looked he was going to have to face angry voters. But then Dodd dropped out of the race, became a lame duck and returned to form as the financial industry’s best friend.

For example, Dodd has abandoned support for a strong independent financial consumer protection agency, instead placing it within the Federal Reserve, which has ignored consumers in the past even though it had authority to protect them. In National Journal’s Clive Crook’s assessment, Dodd’s proposal will enshrine “too big to fail” banks in law rather than fix the problem.

Now the full Senate will consider it. Here’s Barry Ritholtz’s analysis of what should be on the final bill.

Around the Web / Consumer Financial Protection Agency - 03/22/2010

Around the Web: Will the Dodd Abide?

The fight for financial reform enters a new stage this week when Sen. Chris Dodd launches his latest version of his proposal. The New York Times highlights the senator’s weak nods in the direction of granting shareholders more power: giving them “advisory” votes on executive pay and the ability to nominate board members.

Dodd’s earlier proposal was considered stronger than the House reform bill, which was strongly supported by consumer advocates and opposed by bankers and the Obama administration. Dodd is a long-time ally of financial and insurance industries who have backed him over the years. But those close ties were undermining him politically after the financial crisis, so he was attempting to forge the appropriate image of a tough politician. Then Dodd dropped out of his tough reelection bid and he began to back off from some of his positions, like support for a strong and independent Consumer Financial Protection Agency. His effort to negotiate a bipartisan bill broke down and now some are reporting that Dodd has returned to some of the tough positions he had advocated. Here’s Calculated Risk’s breakdown of the proposal Dodd is about to unveil. Though it’s hard to imagine the push for financial reform going any slower, that’s what Republicans want, the Washington Post reports.

At the same time, the American Bankers Association meets in Washington this week, Business Week reports. They are ready to battle any attempt at greater consumer financial protections. They’ll defeat it outright if they can, and fight to water it down if they can’t kill it.

Around the Web / Consumer Financial Protection Agency - 03/14/2010

Loopholes and Lumps of Coal

While the financial industry got a stocking stuffer, we got stiffed.

House Democrats passed something they called reform and handed  it over to the Senate.

But the bill is laden with loopholes, put there by Blue Dogs and New Democrats doing the bidding of the financial institutions.

Democratic leaders, from President Obama to Rep. Barney Frank have demonstrated that they are at best ineffectual in spearheading efforts to win real reform that puts consumers and taxpayers’ interests first. At worst, they're undermining those efforts.

The resilience shown by the financial industry in blunting efforts at sensible regulation has been nothing short of breathtaking.

Despite these setbacks, the battle may not be lost.

Glass-Steagel / Martin Column / President Barack Obama - 12/15/2009