This is Not What Real Democracy Looks Like

Why is the work of the so-called Super Congress deficit panel going to be conducted in secret as if its members were planning a covert military operation?

Do you buy the idea that these decisions its members have to make, which are supposed to cut $1.5 trillion from the federal budget over the next 10 years, are just so tough that if they do it in public they’ll just never get it done?

Do you think that secrecy is designed to protect your interests?

I don’t. The Super-Congress is just the latest example of the fear on steroids politics that our leaders have come to rely on when they shove something nasty down our throats. By now the formula is familiar: create a crisis, warn of dire consequences, limit information and debate.

Meanwhile behind the curtain the politicians can wheel and deal with the lobbyists and bankers who fund their careers. According to them, all theses issues are just too complicated for us common folk to contemplate.

The only thing this secrecy protects is the interests of the lobbyists and the politicians who want to cut their deals without the glare of publicity or the inconvenience of accountability when they sell out the interests of their constituents in favor of their corporate contributors.

The Super-Congress is a microcosm of all the issues raised by the infusion of massive corporate cash and influence into our politics, as well as the poisonous impact of the revolving door between Congress and the businesses that lobby it.

While the president has been railing about the influence of money in politics, his own party has made sure that their top fund-raisers have seats at the Super-Congress table, like Sen. Max Baucus (whose top fundraiser Jim Messina was so good Obama hired him away for his presidential campaign, and Sen. Patty Murray, who also happens to chair the Democratic Senate Campaign Committee, which means it up to her to lead the party’s fundraising efforts to maintain its Senate majority.

The Republicans have also deployed top money-getters like Rep. Jeb Hensarling, who’s vice-chair of the House financial services committees, a traditional money magnet, which has worked well for Hensarling, who since 2009 has snagged at least $35,000 from the giant auditing firm KPMG, another $35,000 from UBS bank and $32,500 from Bank of America.

Who do you think will have access to Baucus, Murray and Hensarling while the Super-Congress deliberates behind closed doors? Ordinary Americans, or those who can make significant contributions to Baucus and Murray’s fundraising efforts?

In response to these potential conflicts, the Project on Government Oversight and other open government groups wrote to congressional leaders urging maximum transparency.

As Bill Buzenberg summed it up in the Guardian, “Over the years, Washington has evolved into a highly oiled special-interest machine, plying candidates with money, on one hand, and grooming insiders to help close the deal, on the other. So far, this ethically corrupt system has proven extraordinarily resistant to reform.”

In response to these potential conflicts, the Project on Government Oversight and other open government groups wrote to congressional leaders urging maximum transparency so that the rest of us can see and read exactly what’s going on. Contact your representative and demand that the Super-Congress conduct our business in public view, the way democracy is supposed to work.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bursting D.C.'s Bubble

The battle for financial reform comes down to the ownership of one critical piece of real estate, one that has managed to avoid the crash that has ended the dreams of security for so many: the nation’s Capital.

“We’re at a critical moment point in our democracy,” Elizabeth Warren, the congressional bailout monitor, told those of us gathered on a webinar Wednesday. “Either the banks own Washington or the people do.”

Warren was referring to something that the Democratic Senate whip, Dick Durbin, said last year about the place where he works, in an rare moment of a politician telling the truth:  “The banks own this place.”

Elizabeth Warren, a tireless promoter of consumer protection and truth teller about the decline of the decline of fortunes of regular folks, prefers to view Durbin’s declaration as premature.

But a more definitive answer is not far off, according to Warren; it could come next month. The full Senate is expected to begin debate on financial reform when it returns from recess this month with a final vote in May.

Congress is one place where the bubble hasn’t burst. The value of those congressional seats hasn’t gone down since the crash; it’s gone up. Representatives and senators are raking n more than ever from corporate lobbyists.

The banks are fully mobilized, unloading $1 million a day to block, neutralize and weaken reform. The webinar, sponsored by Americans for Financial Reform and Americans for Responsible Lending, was an effort to galvanize reform supporters into action.

As reluctant as I am to disagree with Warren about anything, on this one I’m with Durbin. From the evidence, it’s hard to see how Wall Street hasn’t gotten everything it wants from the politicians, even after the greatest financial meltdown since the Depression.

The question is whether we can take back that inflated piece of real estate and reestablish its true value.  Can we turn our frustration and rage over the bailouts and our elected representatives’ impotence into action?

There are marches – April 29th on Wall Street and May 17 on K street, where the lobbyists have their offices. And there are elected representatives to inundate with messages in favor of reform. Reform advocates can’t match the bankers’ cash, but they have people power on their side.

One questioner asked Warren at what point the Senate reform proposal from Sen. Chris Dodd, which was initially strong before Dodd watered it down, would become so weak it wouldn’t be worth supporting. Warren didn’t answer the question directly. “They’re not leaving much margin for error,” she said.

Unfortunately, when it comes to financial reform, the devil is in the details, and we have to insist on real reforms.

That means:

× Breaking up banks that are too big to fail (Dodd’s proposal doesn’t do that now).

× Creating a strong and independent financial consumer protection agency  (Dodd proposes to house it in the Fed, with other banking regulators able to veto the consumer protector’s decisions)

× Forcing banks to have more “skin in the game” (The Senate bill require bankers to keep money in reserve equal to 5 percent of loans they bundle and sell off; European regulators require twice that amount).

× Congress setting the amounts of capital financial institutions would have to keep on hand, rather than leaving it for the regulators to decide.

What we’ve learned in the past several months, from the report on the Lehman bankruptcy and the Fed’s recent disclosures on its involvement in Bear-Stearns takeover by J.P. Morgan, is that regulators weren’t asleep at the switch before, during and after the financial crisis. Rather, the regulators have actively colluded with the banks in an attempt to conceal the banks shady practices. Too much of what is being called financial reform is actually just maintaining the status quo while pretending to overhaul the system.

I don’t agree with a lot of what the Tea Party has offered. They don’t offer much in the way of positive proposals, and seem particularly weak in grappling with the issue of unchecked corporate power. But I think they’ve shown how a group of people (with some corporate funding) can shake up and shape a national debate. The Tea Party has no corner on frustration, anger, betrayal or the sense that something has gone deeply wrong in our country. There’s no reason we can’t channel that frustration and anger to plant the flag of real reform in the middle of real estate that, after all, belongs to us. Now’s the time to do it.
Here’s how to contact your senator and representative. Here’s the web site for Americans for Financial Reform.