Virginia lost its #1 ranking but being #2 isn’t so bad.
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
See the complete list.
Bill Clinton talks about the recession
Bill Clinton makes as much sense as anyone else. He also seems to be admitting he doesn’t know what the silver bullet is. What happened the past 8 years? I thought Clinton left the White House with a balanced budget?
Did Bush just get side-tracked by 9/11 and his wars on terror? How did things get to this point?
Pensions Revisited
There has been an on-going discussion here on Moonhowlings.net about pensions and other retirement plans. Some people here are very much oppose to any plans that are from money in the public coffers. I asked the serious question if those who oppose plans like VRS, Federal Retirement Programs, etc also oppose military retirement. To date, no one has answered me.
Last Sunday, the New York Times featured a section on pensions entitled, In Budget Crisis, States Take Aim at Pension Costs.
Many states are acknowledging this year that they have promised pensions they cannot afford and are cutting once-sacrosanct benefits, to appease taxpayers and attack budget deficits.
Illinois raised its retirement age to 67, the highest of any state, and capped the salary on which public pensions are figured at $106,800 a year, indexed for inflation. Arizona, New York, Missouri and Mississippi will make people work more years to earn pensions. Virginia is requiring employees to pay into the state pension fund for the first time. New Jersey will not give anyone pension credit unless they work at least 32 hours a week.
“We can’t afford to deny reality or delay action any longer,” said Gov. Pat Quinn of Illinois, adding that his state’s pension cuts, enacted in March, will save some $300 million in the first year alone.
But there is a catch: Nearly all of the cuts so far apply only to workers not yet hired. Though heralded as breakthrough reforms by state officials, the cuts phase in so slowly they are unlikely to save the weakest funds and keep them from running out of money. Some new rules may even hasten the demise of the funds they were meant to protect.
Lawmakers wanted to avoid legal battles or fights with unions, whose members can be influential voters. So they are allowing most public workers across the country to keep building up their pensions at the same rate as ever. The tens of thousands of workers now on Illinois’s payrolls, for instance, will still get to retire at 60 — and some will as young as 55.
One striking exception is Colorado, which has imposed cuts on its current workers, not just future hires, and even on people who have already retired. The retirees have sued to block the reduction
Some of the states mentioned have really cushy pensions. Virginia’s pension, the VRS, is rather modest but livable. The rub with the VRS is that back in the early 80’s most individuals had their pension paid by the state or the locality. That happened in leiu of giving pay raises. (see the history of VRS)
The VRS is actually mandated by the Constitution of Virginia. The history also explains the following:
House Joint Resolution 392 of the 1993 General Assembly Session requested the Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission (JLARC) to complete a comprehensive study of VRS. The study concluded:
- VRS should be established as an agency independent of the executive branch of Virginia government.
- The appointment of trustees should be a shared responsibility of the Governor and the General Assembly.
- The VRS trust funds should be established as independent trusts in the Constitution of Virginia.
- The structure of VRS advisory committees should be established in law.
- The General Assembly should designate a permanent legislative commission or committee to carry out continuing oversight of the retirement system.
This series of changes to the Virginia Constitution and the VRS enabling statutes occurred in 1995 and 1996. The Constitution of Virginia (Article X, Section 11) now requires the General Assembly to maintain “…a retirement system for State employees and employees of participating political subdivisions. The funds of the retirement system shall be deemed separate and independent trust funds, shall be segregated from all other funds of the Commonwealth, and shall be invested and administered solely in the interests of the members and beneficiaries thereof.” Today, this includes 237 state agencies, 249 counties, cities and towns, 183 special authorities and 145 school boards. As of June 30, 2009, VRS had nearly 347,000 active members and more than 141,000 retirees and beneficiaries.
Back to the military question: Do those who want to get rid of pensions and retirement for public servants also want to get rid of military retirement? Freedom is not only preserved by fighting our enemy. It is also peserved by knowing how to read and write, and by being able to walk your streets without being killed by domestic enemies we often call thugs. Freedom is knowing that we have first responders to keep us safe.
All are important members of society who deserve to have their pensions kept intact without meddling and without the proverbial hands in the cookie jar. After reading the above, I am not even sure what Virginia did was legal.
NYTimes: Senate Approves Bill to Overhaul Financial Regulation
New York Times email alert:
The Senate on Thursday passed a far-reaching financial
regulatory bill. The legislation is intended to prevent a
repeat of the 2008 crisis, but also reshapes the role of
numerous federal agencies, and vastly empowers the Federal
Reserve, in an attempt to predict and contain future
debacles.Democratic Congressional leaders and the Obama administration
must now work to combine the Senate bill with a version
approved by the House in December, a process that is expected
to take several weeks.
How will news of this Senate bill’s passage impact Wall Street? The stock market which has been free falling lately?
Do we need financial regulation or is the meddling in the free market?
West Wing Blog
The West Wing Blog csan now be found at www.whitehouse.gov/blog
According to the Washington Post:
You didn’t see this on CNN or Fox News or NBC: President Obama awkwardly introducing Chile’s president, Sebastián Piñera, to the Netherlands’ prime minister, Jan Peter Balkenende, at the recent nuclear security summit. “You know, uh, you’ve met Jan?” the president says tentatively as the other world leaders stand aside like shy kids at a dance.
Or this: Obama, playfully doing his best impression of Muhammad Ali, throwing mock punches into the midsection of a costumed Easter Bunny following the White House Easter Egg Roll.
You didn’t see it on the networks because the behind-the-scenes video was only available on “West Wing Week,” the Obama administration’s new video blog. The six- to seven-minute compilations, which appear each week on the White House’s Web site (http://www.whitehouse.gov) and on such video-sharing sites as YouTube, offer what a narrator on each segment calls “your guide to everything that’s happening at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.”
The West Wing blog will show video not shown by the major cable networks or nightly news that gives a bird’s eye view of what’s really going on behind the scenes.
In this video, President Obama talks with Americans about why the Wall Street reform is important to anyone who has ever used a credit card, gotten a loan, bought a car or a house, uses an ATM, has a checking account, etc. He talks to ordinary Americans who just might not have a private political agenda:
Dodd pledges hearings into market plunge
According to Politico:
Sen. Chris Dodd (D- Conn.) pledged Sunday that Congress will hold multiple hearings “right away” to explore how computerized trading allowed the markets to plunge suddenly this week.
“We need some answers pretty quickly on this issue,” the chairman of the Banking Committee said on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”
He said the Securities and Exchange Commission needs to “step up very quickly and let us know what happened here and what steps need to be taken.”
“I don’t think you need legislation in this area, my guess is,” Dodd said. “You need the regulators to step up and make sure that this high frequency trading, this flash trading that’s going on…that clearly is something we ought to take a look at.”
He appeared on CBS’ “Face the Nation” with Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.), the ranking member on the Banking committee. Shelby seemed to agree with each of Dodd’s points on the flash trading issue.
“I believe what’s really happened is the technology has gotten ahead of the regulators, and the regulators have got to get ahead of the technology,” Shelby said. “That’s going to be a big challenge down the road. Otherwise we could have more of this.”
Dodd said he asked Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.), the chairman of the relevant subcommittee, to spearhead the Senate’s examination.
Dodd also sought to use the bizarre market behavior as another reason why Congress must pass regulatory reform next week, which he said will create an “early warning system.”
“We’re trying to deal with systemic risk,” he said. “We need to get in place our bill, have the president sign it, so we have the tools to protect our economy from these kinds of events
Probably no one is more hell bent on leaving office with financial reform finalized and enacted into law than Senator Chris Dodd. Early on Dodd declined taking over Senator Kennedy’s committees so he could aggressively work towards finance reform. The bizarre freefall in the market on Wednesday has not been fully explained yet. At first finance experts thought it was the riots in Greece. Then they attributed the fall to human error, thinking someone had typed on a B (billion) instead of M (million). Then came the computer glitch theory. So far no definitive reason has been given for the Dow’s drop in 1000 points. It regained more than600 of those points 15 minutes later. However, it was one hell of a drop that set off national panic and the markets have not yet recovered.
Chris Dodd is determinted to seek reasons and to fix the situation so it can’t happen again. Meanwhile, some of the pundits are advising selling equities. No one is saying where people should put their investments, however. Those with 401ks simply don’t have that many options open to them, as a rule.
It is time for the naysayers, may of whom simply don’t have the knowledge to make complex financial recommendations, to shut up. It is time to put partisan politics aside, for the good of us all. Macro-economics is a complicated subject and one that after a point, lends itself simply to theory. Let’s bring in all the experts and disregard those who are experts only in their own minds.
Greece Riots in the Street; Our DOW Drops 1000 Points in Minutes
Greece had rioting in its streets near its parliament. As these events unfolded on TV, the DOW dropped 1000 points in a matter of minutes. The American stocks didn’t stay down at -`1000 for long. It came back somewhat, if we call -330 a come back. Investors might want to check their assets.
A work related call prevented me from seeing the entire free fall. Where is Formerly Anonymous to do some interpreting for us? We can’t say he hasn’t warned us of impending doom.
UPDATE: The DOW is hovering just under 300 down. Fox News is saying they just got word that there was a bad trade on Proctor and Gamble. (whatever that means) Who knows. All this is beyond my pay grade.
Not with a bang but a whimper….
The Opt Out Resolution, that call to arms by Corey Stewart passed the BOCS on Tuesday, not with a bang but a whimper. What passed in a 6-2 vote, was a resolution that directs the county staff to find out how much new federal health care regulations will cost Prince William County. Both Supervisors Jenkins and Principi voted against this Resolution because they felt it was taking the staff off their regular jobs and that staff was already short.
From the News and Messenger:
With a vote of 6-2, Prince William supervisors Tuesday passed a resolution that directs staff to find out how much new federal health care regulations will cost the county.
The resolution also requires staff to report these costs to the board and to alert state and federal authorities if there’s a problem—that is, if the regulations amount to unfunded mandates that will require supervisors to raise taxes or cut essential services.
Supervisors John Jenkins, D-Neabsco, and Frank Principi, D-Woodbridge, voted against the measure after attempts to amend the document—to set up a committee to study the issue and to direct staff to research and report on tax-saving benefits of the federal health care plan—failed.
The actual resolution that passed is a watered-down version of what was originally proposed, and is in not a call to opt-out of the federal health care plan. It does not support, or even mention, the state’s lawsuit against the federal law, either. Rather, the resolution, which is available online at the county government’s website, http://www.pwcgov.org, is a directive to staff.
This Resolution is a far cry from what was originally proposed for our county by Corey Stewart, early in April at a political rally down in Stafford County. Stewart originally said he was proposing a resolution that would direct the staff not to honor new medicaid claims that were to be ushered in January 1, 2014 as a result of HCR. By April 15, Stewart was handing out fliers at a Tea Party Tax Rally calling his proposal an Opt Out Resolution. By the time Moonhowlings.net received a copy, there was no ‘Opt Out,’ just a directive for staff to study the costs and report back to the board. Funny how that all worked out, isn’t it?
Good work, citizens of Prince William County. It looks like we avoided another Stewart Folly. Hats off to the supervisors who voted no. As our regular, George Harris, has stated, he found out much of what he needed to know by making a couple phone calls. Why can’t the county do the same thing rather than turning every issue into a circus?
Big Government and Eating Your Words
Its all rhetoric and political swashbuckling until real world problems become your own.
Today’s Washington Post has an excellent opinion piece written by Dana Millbank entitled, Through Oil-fouled Water, Big Government Looks Better and Better. The entire article has been posted below because every word needs to be taken to heart and read carefully. There was simply no part that could be considered for truncating purposes.
Through Oil-fouled Water, Big Government Looks Better and Better
Dana Millbank, Washington Post
There is something exquisite about the moment when a conservative decides he needs more government in his life.
About 10:30 Monday morning, Sen. David Vitter (R-La.), an ardent foe of big government, posted a blog item on his campaign Web site about the huge oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. “I strongly believe BP is spread too thin,” he wrote.
The poor dears. He thinks it would be a better arrangement if “federal and state officials” would do the dirty work of “protecting and cleaning up the coast” instead of BP.
About an hour later came word from the Pentagon that Alabama, Florida and Mississippi — all three governed by men who once considered themselves limited-government conservatives — want the federal government to mobilize (at taxpayer expense, of course) more National Guard troops to aid in the cleanup.
That followed an earlier request by the small-government governor of Louisiana, Bobby Jindal (R), who issued a statement saying he had called the Obama administration “to outline the state’s needs” and to ask “for additional resources.” Said Jindal: “These resources are critical.”
About the time that Alabama, Florida and Mississippi were asking for more federal help, three small-government Republican senators, Richard Shelby and Jeff Sessions of Alabama and George LeMieux of Florida, were flying over the gulf on a U.S. government aircraft with small-government Republican Rep. Jeff Miller (Fla.).
“We’re here to send the message that we’re going to do everything we can from a federal level to mitigate this,” Sessions said after the flight, “to protect the people and make sure when people are damaged that they’re made whole.”
Sessions, probably the Senate’s most ardent supporter of tort reform, found himself extolling the virtues of litigation — against BP. “They’re not limited in liability on damage, so if you’ve suffered a damage, they are the responsible party,” said Sessions, sounding very much like the trial lawyers he usually maligns.
All these limited-government guys expressed their belief that the British oil company would ultimately cover all the costs of the cleanup. “They’re not too big to fail,” Sessions said. “If they can’t pay and they’ve given it everything they’ve got, then they should cease to exist.” But if you believe that the federal government won’t be on the hook for a major part of the costs, perhaps you’d like to buy a leaky oil well in the Gulf of Mexico.
It may have taken an ecological disaster, but the gulf-state conservatives’ newfound respect for the powers and purse of the federal government is a timely reminder for them. As conservatives in Washington complain about excessive federal spending, the ones who would suffer the most from spending cuts are their own constituents.
An analysis of data from the nonpartisan Tax Foundation by Washington Post database specialist Dan Keating found that people in states that voted Republican were by far the biggest beneficiaries of federal spending. In states that voted strongly Republican, people received an average of $1.50 back from the federal government for every dollar they paid in federal taxes. In moderately Republican states, the amount was $1.19. In moderately Democratic states, people received on average of 99 cents in federal funds for each dollar they paid in taxes. In strongly Democratic states, people got back just 86 cents on the tax dollar.
If Sessions and Shelby succeed in shrinking government, their constituents in Alabama will be some of the biggest losers: They get $1.66 in federal benefits for every $1 they pay in taxes. If Louisiana’s Vitter succeeds in shrinking government, his constituents will lose some of the $1.78 in federal benefits they receive for every dollar in taxes they pay. In Mississippi, it’s $2.02.
That may explain why, as the oil slick hits the Gulf Coast, lawmakers from the region are willing to swallow their limited-government principles as they dangle federal aid before their constituents. Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) said he would “make sure the federal government is poised to assist in every way necessary.” His colleague Thad Cochran (R-Miss.) said he is making sure “the federal government is doing all it can” — even as he added his hope that “industry” would pay.
President Obama tried to remind the government-is-the-enemy crowd of this situation in a speech on Saturday. “Government is the police officers who are protecting our communities, and the servicemen and -women who are defending us abroad,” he said. “Government is the roads you drove in on and the speed limits that kept you safe. Government is what ensures that mines adhere to safety standards and that oil spills are cleaned up by the companies that caused them.”
For the moment, some of the conservatives have new appreciation for governmental powers. “We’re going to have the oil industry folks, the BP folks, in front of us on the Commerce Committee,” Florida’s LeMieux vowed in the news conference Monday. “We’re going to talk about these drilling issues.”
But not before the taxpayer sends some more big-government money down to the small-government politicians of the gulf.
At what point do we stop thinking that the other person’s needs are frivolous and our own important? Are the politicians in the gulf states who are banging the drum about smaller government opportunists? Hypocrites? Or could it be that all those elected officials just needed a reality check about what we do when disaster hits us?
Senate Word of the Day: One Sh!tty Deal
Financial reform is something we all agree upon, or do we? We all agree we need it, we just don’t know how we need it or agree on the fix. The Senate Republicans voted Monday night against moving forward with debate on the financial reform bill. I guess both sides of the aisle will have to go back to the drawing board. Too bad they can’t kick the lobbyists out.
Meanwhile. the Senate continues to grill Goldman Sachs executives over suspected wrongdoing on their part during the 2008 financial crisis. Some of the highlights may be seen below. The senators seemed to fixate on some verbage that boils down to ‘one sh!tty deal.’ Perhaps that really is the crux of the matter.
There don’t seem to be many heroes out there but the big zero is one executive director Fabrice Tourre, who is the subject of a fraud lawsuit by the Securities and Exchange Commission. Fabrice nicknamed himself ‘fab Fab’. This ego driven maniac will not find U.S. Senators quite as taken by him as his girlfriends have been.
One of his emails to one of the 2 women he was dangling contained the following from the New York Daily News:
Six months later, Tourre joked about finding new suckers. “I have managed to sell a few Abacus bonds to widows and orphans that I ran into at the airport,” he writes, adding, “Not feeling too guilty about this.”
In case you didn’t understand the Washington Post’s video from ABC News, I have included Jon Stewart’s take on these Senate Hearings. Jon Stewart made a lot more sense to me. He cut to the chase. The Timberwolf really does seem to be ‘one sh!tty deal.’ Then there is that real sleaze bag, the Fabulous Fab, making his fortune off the backs of widows and orphans. Stewart mourns the death of the elephonkey.
| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon – Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
| Who Wants to Beat a Millionaire | ||||
|
||||
The GS people truly are playing with us. According to the Washington Post:
Goldman hired lawyers who formerly worked on the committee to prepare the executives; one of those lawyers once told a trade journal that the best strategy is “long, thoughtful pauses followed by rambling non-responsive answers.” The executives practiced the technique.
At one point, Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) asked Tourre about an e-mail he wrote that suggested he was looking to sell mortgage-backed investments only to unsophisticated investors. But, taking his time, he asked her three times to identify which e-mail she meant and to repeat her question.
“I cannot help but get the feeling that a strategy of the witnesses is to try to burn through the time of each questioner,” Collins responded in an exasperated tone.
These people seem to think they are above the law and far above the rest of us. They sicken me. So many people lost so much; people who trusted banks and financial institutions to do the right thing. Were we all duped? How close to financial ruin were we all? We were on the precipice while these bastards played the system. It wasn’t just Goldman Sachs. Apparently the problem was ubiquitous.
Dow Finished above 11,000 Today
The Dow Jones Industrial Average (the Dow) finished above 11,000 today for the first time in 18 months. Loans issued to financially plagued Greece seemed to nudge the Dow upwards. Much has been made of the Dow reaching 11k. it stood for some sort of psychological ceiling that the Dow had to pass.
Many financial gurus are warning us that financial woes are far from over and to proceed with caution. Is this a good time to get back in the market or have you been here all along. Is this the time to hide your cash under the mattress or in the backyard in a jar? How about the freezer?
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
McTaxes?
The other day, some of us were batting around some conversation here on ‘Howlings and the subject of a drive through tax came up. I said I had never heard of anything like that. I called a family member who works in the city and would have reason to know about drive through taxes. She said the city had a meals tax and that was all.
I came back with that response. Another reader came along and told me I must never go to McDonalds and told me politely that I was incorrect. There was a carry out tax. Ok. Me wrong? Not the first time and won’t be the last. I retracted, corrected and did what normal people do in situations like that. So today I swung into McDonalds to see what I was missing (other than heartburn). There it was, TAKE OUT TAX, right there on the receipt.
I was madder than hell at those supervisors for sneaking a tax through on us. Then I got mad at myself for being so unaware. Then I contacted a friend who works for the county in high places. I was told there was no PWC ‘TAKE OUT TAX’ and that I had been robbed.
Do places other than McDonald’s charge a TAKE OUT TAX? How dare a restaurant call something a tax that is clearly a surcharge on their services? Well, they don’t. I sent Mr. Howler out bright and early for one more McD’s trip. i told him not to come home without a receipt. Myth.
McDonalds is not charging a tax. They have stupid words in front of the word tax, like TAKE OUT. Some are marked EAT IN. It is simply the 5% VA sales tax. Panic over. Prince William County does not have a meals tax. Past referendums have not passed. The City of Manassas does have a meals tax. McDonalds does not have a special tax.
I hope this clears up this misconception. Feel free to dispute. If someone knows something I don’t, I am all ears.
State will dip into pension fund, repay with 7.5% interest
The Virginia General Assembly just couldn’t help itself. It had to put the sticky fingers into the pension fund before closing for the session.
The State of Virginia is helping itself to more than $620 MILIION that belongs in the state pension fund, VRS, to pay pensions to state employees, some county employees and teachers. Virginia must begin to pay back the money by 2013 at an interest rate of 7.5% over 10 years.
Predictable. So the state who must have a balanced budget doesn’t really have one and the Emperor has no clothes. According to the Richmond Times Dispatch:
The provision, sought by the state Senate and included in the joint budget adopted by the General Assembly yesterday, is aimed at easing jitters over the decision to defer state and local payments to pension plans for the portion of future retirement liabilities that aren’t funded by the system.
Sen. Walter A. Stosch, R-Henrico, called the provision the most important step taken by the assembly to protect the retirement system, even as it relies on deferred pension contributions for almost one-fourth of the money used to balance the two-year budget.
“I don’t want anybody to feel that their pension is in jeopardy, because it isn’t,“ Stosch said yesterday. “But we’re recognizing the unfunded liability and requiring it to be repaid.“
But that wasn’t the only important step taken by the legislature to guard the $48 billion retirement system. It also adopted a package of changes that will lower the cost of pensions for future employees by more than $50 million in the next two years and $3 billion over a decade.
The above sounds like politico-speak for “I’m from the government and I am here to help you.” The warm, fuzzy feeling just isn’t there if you have anything to do with the $48 Billion VRS. This sounds like the government doing what the government does best: Robbing Peter to pay Paul. However, there is no free lunch. Retirement ages will increase and a greater part of employee contributions will come of the the employee’s pocket.
This house of cards doesn’t sound like the foundation is real firm:
House budget officials had argued that the deferral would not harm the retirement system because of benefit changes that would reduce long-term costs and a likely recovery of stock market investments.
The VRS lost 21% of its assets during the free fall of 2008. Actually, it ended up better than most individuals. However, I don’t think our lawmakers should be gambling pension money away on the shaky premise that the stock market earnings are going to take up the slack.
Part 2 will continue when more unfolds about the great robbery of 2010. (subtitle: Public Employees: This will only Hurt for the Rest of Your Lives) They just couldn’t keep their grubby mitts out of the pension fund. News is sketchy at this point on the great robbery. If the Washington Post even mentioned it, I didn’t see it. The budget news is overwhelmingly horrible.
NOT ANY MORE. DADDY HAS HIS HAND IN THE POT.
Some Fall 2008 Financial Post Mortum
Let’s re-examine what the experts say.
Paulson on AIG and Lehman
Buffett a Year After the Crash
It makes more sense to hear what the experts say than it does for non experts to fight about the economy on the blogs. And if I am not mistaken, Paulson and Buffett are both Republicans. Both have forgotten more about money than I have ever learned. Paulson is also out of Goldman Sachs. He is well respected and worth a fortune. He stepped up to the plate to serve his country. He had nothing to lose and everything to gain.
Dodd Forges Ahead with Financial Reform Bill with or without Republican Support
From Marketwatch:
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) — After months of trying to get Republican support for tougher regulations to prevent the next global financial crisis, Sen. Chris Dodd has decided to move ahead with or without bipartisan backing.
Dodd desperately wants a financial reform bill as a capstone to his 36-year career in Washington. But his lengthy negotiations with his Republican counterparts Richard Shelby and Bob Corker had produced little agreement, just headlines.
Dodd, the chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, announced Thursday that he would present his own bill to his committee on Monday. The banking committee — with 13 Democrats and 10 Republicans — will likely vote on the bill next week.
Dodd’s decision to abandon an endless quest to reach a bipartisan deal may make it more likely that Congress will actually enact legislation this year to rein in the worst of the abuses that helped lead the global economy to the brink.
The more Dodd negotiated with Shelby and Corker, the more watered-down the bill became. Each compromise with the Republicans made it less likely that the House of Representatives — remember them? — would go along.
The last straw may have been when Corker demanded that any consumer protection agency would not only have to be toothless, but it would also have to be run by the Federal Reserve, the omnipotent agency that utterly failed to protect consumers, the banks or the economy during the housing bubble.
The path to landing a final bill on President Barack Obama’s desk will still be complicated. Dodd will have to clear the bill out of his own committee and then find at least one Republican in the 100-member Senate to help him overcome the inevitable filibuster. And then he’ll have to compromise with the House.
By all accounts, the Republicans negotiated in good faith. But there were some issues that just couldn’t be compromised. It is time to act.
It seems like regulations are desperately needed. I don’t ever want another September 2008 again, where we all sit there and watch whatever we have accumulated melt away before our eyes. I don’t want the rich to get richer and the middle income folks to become poor folks, often at our expense. This is one reason that the Republicans have earned the moniker ‘The Party of NO.
Dodd has nothing to lose. He isn’t coming back. I thank him for sticking with this one. He was also offered Kennedy’s chair. He refused it because he wanted to deal with campaign finance. It’s time for Democrats and Republicans to do the right thing and pass some reform, even if in incremental steps.
