Congress finds a bipartisan issue: Wall Street

Good news!
Congress has come together in the spirit of bipartisanship to "get things done".
You remember what that's like, don't you?
Just check out the Third Way web site, where they proudly brag "We supported and helped pass into law the Simpson-Bowles commission".
It's in a similar spirit that Congress acted Monday.

A group of senators on Monday rolled out a rare, bipartisan agreement years in the making that would relax a number of banking regulations enacted after the 2008 financial crisis.
...The compromise would ease regulations on small, community banks as well as several larger lenders that have been subject to stricter oversight because they have more than $50 billion in assets.
But with nine Republicans, eight Democrats and one independent senator signing on, the package had a significant head start on the way to advancing through the Senate, where bipartisan agreement is essential to passing most laws.
“Our bill is an example of how if Democrats and Republicans can put partisanship aside and work together, we can reach real compromises that support the country,” Sen. Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D.) said.

Doesn't it just warm your heart that Republicans and Blue Dog Dems can work together with the idea that Wall Street banks with more than $50 Billion shouldn't be punished with regulations?
Of course not everyone feels the same.

While five of these senators face re-election next year and come from states won decisively by President Donald Trump, Democrats scored a major victory over Trumpism in Virginia just last week, winning the governor’s race and potentially wrestling control of the heavily gerrymandered House of Delegates. Having Virginia’s senators engineer a bank deregulation bill days later sits uncomfortably with that triumph of the resistance.
“Using a moment the Democratic base is busy fighting the corporate giveaways in Trump’s tax scam to push through a gift-wrapped present for bank lobbyists is as cynical as Washington gets,” said Kurt Walters, campaign director for Rootstrikers, a grassroots progressive group.
...Despite nonstop political caterwauling between Democrats and Republicans, nothing brings Congress together like following the banking industry’s wishes.
“With scandals at Wells Fargo and Equifax so recent or even ongoing, Congress ought to be passing robust new consumer protections, not doing favors for banks,” said Stanley.

There are still two bipartisan issues in Washington: Wall Street and war.

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Meteor Man's picture

In The Democratic Party.

Ok, I'm stumped, stymied and baffled. How do you do that? The DLC, Mainstream media, GOS and all kinds of websites manage to pull it off. Nope, no gambling going on at Rick's Cafe. America is the land of the free. No problem here.

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"They'll say we're disturbing the peace, but there is no peace. What really bothers them is that we are disturbing the war." Howard Zinn

divineorder's picture

....

Rootstrikers call out Schumer...

...

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A truth of the nuclear age/climate change: we can no longer have endless war and survive on this planet. Oh sh*t.

@divineorder
5 or 6 Republicans to go along with Democrats because Republicans were willing to remain in the minority to purge people like Sens. Mike Castle and Richard Lugar. The Democrats should learn from their experience.

If I lived in a district represented by a blue dog I'd vote Republican. Apparently the single issue that unites Democrats is that Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi deserve nicer offices.

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Hillbilly Dem's picture

-Firesign Theatre alums Proctor and Bergman

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"Just call me Hillbilly Dem(exit)."
-H/T to Wavey Davey

The Aspie Corner's picture

Wall Street blowjobs and military handjobs. But when it comes to the rest of us? Nope. We can just drink lead.

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Modern education is little more than toeing the line for the capitalist pigs.

Guerrilla Liberalism won't liberate the US or the world from the iron fist of capital.

We move our accounts to small community banks to get fewer and lower banking fees.
Now, it doesn't matter. Fees will jump. Community banks can compete...yeah! That's the ticket!

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"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

snoopydawg's picture

There is no way people can say that there is a difference between the two parties. The only difference between them is on social issues that don't get in the way of profits.
Have you noticed how no republicans vote with democrats as often as the blue dog democrats do with the republicans? There seems to have always been 5-6 democrats that can be counted on to vote with republicans.

House Approves $700B 'Cash Cow for Weapons Companies'—But Single Payer 'Too Expensive'

In a bipartisan show of support for endless war and out-of-control military spending, the House of Representatives on Tuesday overwhelmingly approved the nearly $700 billion National Defense Authorization Act of 2018 that aims to boost war outlays by $80 billion—an amount that critics noted would easily cover the costs of free public college tuition and other initiatives that are frequently dismissed as too expensive.

"Flint still doesn't have drinking water, we are told we cannot have affordable single-payer, free college education is too costly, we do not have money to help the homeless, we do not have money to fix our infrastructure."

The final vote tally was 357-70, with 127 Democrats throwing their support behind the bill. Sixty-seven Democrats—including Reps. Barbara Lee of California, Keith Ellison of Minnesota, and John Conyers of Michigan—voted against the legislation.

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@snoopydawg email yesterday about that abomination. His name is Adam Smith, isn't that cute? And his webpage has all this crap about the Yemen resolution he's so proud of, how he works so hard for our Veterans, blah, blah, blah. I pointed all those contradictions out, and then I asked him if he really knew just what his namesake meant by a "free market" and told him he'd best go back and read that book again. As Michael Hudson pointed out, Adam Smith was talking about a market free of the rentier/parasite class of entrenched aristocracy, he wasn't spouting trickle down economics as a "free" market. I know it'll do no good but I made me feel better!

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Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur

strollingone's picture

never before have so many owed so much to so few.

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I forget who it was- Mark Twain or Will Rogers maybe- who said whenever they brag up the bipartisan angle you know the public is getting extra bigly plundered.

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bygorry

Song of the lark's picture

trying to oppose and correct kleptocracy stuff is a lost cause. It will have to collapse on its own over reach and greed. It may not happen in my life time even though on many days I think the status quo will break. Until then and until the long knives come out, this debt slave will burrow deeper into the salt mine, and work it, work it , work it.

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enhydra lutris's picture

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That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

strollingone's picture

@enhydra lutris
the government controls the corporations, what is it called when the corporations control the government? "Social nationalism"?

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@strollingone

If it is called "national socialism" when

the government controls the corporations, what is it called when the corporations control the government? "Social nationalism"?

I know you didn't ask me, but if you did ask me, I'd suggest the suggestion of an 'anti-' in front of that 'social'...

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Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.

A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.

strollingone's picture

@Ellen North
anti- to make "antisocial nationalism" the current term for the case in which corporations control the government. Maybe it could be corporment or governations?

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@strollingone

Oh, I think 'corporment', as there's certainly no actual governing about it - wouldn't you say?

Or since there are multiple corporations involved, perhaps Anti-Social Corpserment? That describes what they do to the public, economy and environment, too.

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Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.

A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.

strollingone's picture

@Ellen North
Bet if we post it enough times and places it will catch on.

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@strollingone

Lol, we'll start a new rant craze!

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Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.

A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.