Wall Street Reform Floor Fight
We look forward to a televised floor fight where the question Senators will need to answer is simple: ‘Are you for Wall Street, or Main Street?’
Excerpted from Ed Mierzwinski’s blog:
After Senate Banking Committee ranking member Richard Shelby (R-AL) announced that while his members would not vote for the financial reform package, they would not delay it either, a manager’s amendment to the previous discussion draft prepared by Chairman Chris Dodd (D-CT) was approved 13-10 on a party line vote. Floor action is expected before Memorial Day. We look forward to a floor fight, where Senators will have to answer simple questions in front of C-Span cameras. Questions I can think of include these:
1. Are you for Wall Street, or Main Street?
2. Do you want the regulators who failed to protect us to have a veto over the new consumer financial protection agency?
3. Do you want shadow market players to come out into the sunlight, or not?
4. Do you want the regulators who let the credit card companies cheat and trick us enforce the new Credit CARD Act, or do you want an strong independent CFPA to protect consumers?
Can you think of others? Will it be a floor fight, where some Senators defend Wall Street’s reckless actions and block final passage of a good bill with senseless dilatory and pernicious amendments and procedural barriers, or will the TV lights and the public’s attention help bring a good bill forward more easily? We’ll see. But as Justice Brandeis famously opined (in a book, not a decision) — “sunlight is the best disinfectant, and electric light the best policeman.”
Here’s OSPIRG’s press statement.