Who Will Take On the Banks?

[SHRED]

---

Another Robert Scheer article that hits the mark.


---

Who Will Take On the Banks?

Posted on Jan 22, 2008


And then (again) there were three: Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards, the three Democratic candidates most likely to be invited to presidential debates, take the stage in Myrtle Beach, S.C., on Monday.

By Robert Scheer

~SNIP~

With a military budget that has more than doubled since 9/11, soaking up trillions of dollars in obligations for future generations, it is stupid to argue about whether the Democrats or Republicans would spend more on needed domestic programs, because the money for those programs will not be available. Kucinich was the one candidate on the Democratic side willing to do what Rep. Ron Paul has in the Republican debates—challenge the phony patriotism of ripping off the taxpayers for war-fighting expenditures in Iraq and elsewhere, leaving us less secure.

While Paul is very good, indeed the best candidate, on the waste of taxpayer dollars on foreign military ventures, as is expected from a libertarian, he is hostile to the need for government regulation to control the excesses of the marketplace. And it is those excesses that are at the root of the financial chaos we have visited upon the world. As with the Enron scandal, which was the direct result of the bipartisan-supported deregulation of the energy industry, so too the subprime mortgage and easy-credit scandals now upon us. For decades, banking lobbyists have pushed through legislation freeing them to wreak havoc on our lives while they profit from lucrative personal bailouts even as their own companies suffer.

Deregulation became the mantra covering corporate theft in both Republican and Democratic administrations, and it is amazing that not one of her interlocutors at the South Carolina debate asked Sen. Clinton about her husband’s signing of the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999, which permitted banks, stockbrokers and insurance companies to merge, overturning one of the major regulatory achievements of the New Deal. More important, both political parties have refused to place any serious restraints on the interest charged by banks and think it perfectly normal, indeed healthful, for the economy that folks are given home loans or credit cards at unrealistically low interest rates calculated to soar after an introductory phase. What a sorry scene to see the top Democratic contenders unable to agree that some interest rates below 30 percent may rise to the level of usury.

~SNIP~

FULL ARTICLE:
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20080122_who_will_take_on_the_banks/

---

[KoKo]

1. Gramm, Leach, Blily Act: A New Frontier in Financial Services...Yeah...Right!

Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act: A New Frontier in Financial Services

TO: The Chief Executive Officer of All Bank Holding Companies and State Member Banks in the Twelfth Federal Reserve District

This brochure highlights the major provisions of the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (the “Act”), which was signed into law in November 1999. As I am sure you are aware, the law updated U.S. financial services laws and removed the remaining walls that fragmented the financial marketplace. This legislation, which represents the most significant change in the U.S. financial services industry in 66 years, repealed the core provisions of the Glass-Steagall Act and the Bank Holding Company Act that restricted bank holding companies from affiliating with securities firms and insurance companies.

The Act now permits banks, insurance companies, securities firms, and other financial institutions to affiliate under common ownership and offer their customers a complete range of financial services. As you know, the Act established two new corporate vehicles for the conduct of financial service activities -- the financial holding company and the financial subsidiary. The Act also established the concept of functional regulation of subsidiaries of financial holding companies, and established the Federal Reserve as the umbrella supervisor.

http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache:_9C2lzaJ8jkJ:www.frbsf.org/publications/banking/gramm/+Gramm-Leach-Bliley+Act&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=11&gl=us&client=firefox-a