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Chris Dodds retiring is the end to Peter Schiff Political career- I hope I'm wrong. But, as much as I dislike many Democratic Politicians I remain in awe of their abilities as Politicians and to get out the vote. Blumenthal is a five term Attorney General who has been smart of enough never to run for the Deadend job of being the Governor of Conn. The Conn Democratic Machine will be operating at full speed and the will get out the vote in the large Cities.
Bluementhal's fund raising in the coming months will make Peter Schiffs campaign look like a Lemonade stand - an Attorney General for 5 terms there are a lot of Big dollar contributors who will be donating. Just a guess -I'm often wrong.
I agree. Strategically this was a solid move by CFR team 1, I mean the Democrats. CFR team 2, and the libertarians will have an uphill battle.
[maybe a bank that just repaid TARP qualifies as "private" ]
You'll note that I purposefully mentioned the Revolving Door. This implies that Dodd is going to be gainfully employed by a FIRE economy group that needs lobbyists with his kind of connections.
In the past few days since Connecticut Senator Chris Dodd announced that he would not run for reelection, we have seen not one but two polls showing Richard Blumenthal, the presumptive Democratic nominee to replace Dodd, leading all Republican comers by margins in excess of 20 and even 30 percentage points. How have the leading election prognosticators taken this?
The Rothenberg Political Report moved the race from toss-up with Dodd in the race to clear Democratic advantage with Blumenthal in the race. The Cook Political Report moved the race from leans Republican with Dodd in the race to a tossup with Blumenthal in the race.
How a race in a Democratic state with an extremely popular Democratic candidate leading in the polls by a wide margin in a tossup is unclear to me. But, at the least, we can say at the end of this week, which has seen a great deal of political turmoil, the Democrats' chances at holding on to the Connecticut Senate seat have clearly improved.
Jan. 15 (Bloomberg) -- Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd has indicated he may consider dropping the Consumer Financial Protection Agency from the financial regulatory overhaul bill he is drafting with members of his panel, according to people familiar with negotiations.
Dodd, 65, may agree to shelve the proposed agency, a priority for the Obama administration, and replace it with a division within another federal agency to help advance the broader bill, said the people, who declined to be identified because negotiations are ongoing...
...The financial-services industry opposes the consumer agency more than any other provision in the Obama plan and has lobbied members of Congress to defeat the proposal.
“The most effective solution to strengthen consumer protection is to keep the regulation of the bank and the products it sells within the same regulator,” said Scott Talbott, senior vice president of government affairs at the Financial Services Roundtable, a Washington-based industry trade group...
Jan. 15 (Bloomberg) -- Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd has indicated he may consider dropping the Consumer Financial Protection Agency from the financial regulatory overhaul bill he is drafting with members of his panel, according to people familiar with negotiations.
Dodd, 65, may agree to shelve the proposed agency, a priority for the Obama administration, and replace it with a division within another federal agency to help advance the broader bill, said the people, who declined to be identified because negotiations are ongoing...
...The financial-services industry opposes the consumer agency more than any other provision in the Obama plan and has lobbied members of Congress to defeat the proposal.
“The most effective solution to strengthen consumer protection is to keep the regulation of the bank and the products it sells within the same regulator,” said Scott Talbott, senior vice president of government affairs at the Financial Services Roundtable, a Washington-based industry trade group...
You forgot this paragraph;
Dodd, who announced on Jan. 6 that he will retire later this year, released a draft of his legislation in November that included the consumer agency. It was met with opposition from Republicans, prompting Dodd to scrap his plan and form working groups of senators on his committee to craft a bipartisan bill.
Republicans are blocking virtually everything in the Senate. They are firmly in the pockets of the FIRE interests will not allow even the slightest opposition to their masters desires. It would only take 1 or 2 Republicans and significant reforms would be moving rapidly through the Senate.
Republicans are blocking virtually everything in the Senate. They are firmly in the pockets of the FIRE interests will not allow even the slightest opposition to their masters desires. It would only take 1 or 2 Republicans and significant reforms would be moving rapidly through the Senate.
So Dodd and the Democrats think the right thing to do is to roll over and acquiesce?
That fits into the same catagory as "the dog ate my homework"...
The problem is that it now takes 60/100 votes for any bill to get passed through the senate. With Kennedy's death, the democrats basically have 58 votes - Lieberman will opportunistically derail any meaningful reform -- even though he promised the senate democrats that he would be loyal to the democrats if he was supported (as an independent) over the democratic nominee (Ted Lamont) in the 2006 CT Senate race. It was scandolous that most establishment Democrats (including Obama) supported Joe Lieberman over their own party candidate.
Ned Lamont is now running for the Governor of CT. With Susan Bysiewicz’s stunning decision to pull out of the governor’s race, Lamont is the likely Democratic nominee. The polls show that the Democrats will easily win the Goveror's race in CT.
The problem is that it now takes 60/100 votes for any bill to get passed through the senate. With Kennedy's death, the democrats basically have 58 votes - Lieberman will opportunistically derail any meaningful reform -- even though he promised the senate democrats that he would be loyal to the democrats if he was supported (as an independent) over the democratic nominee (Ted Lamont) in the 2006 CT Senate race. It was scandolous that most establishment Democrats (including Obama) supported Joe Lieberman over their own party candidate.
Ned Lamont is now running for the Governor of CT. With Susan Bysiewicz’s stunning decision to pull out of the governor’s race, Lamont is the likely Democratic nominee. The polls show that the Democrats will easily win the Goveror's race in CT.
In light of political circumstances, I do not see reason for faith in Democrats. They have proven themselves to be every bit at the beck and call of the FIRE industry. It's not that Republicans are blocking reform (if they were in power, it would be "the Democrats are blocking reform!"), it is that all the goings-on of "reform" is theater, and that all significant changes happen in favor of recklessness and the interests of the FIRE lobby. Hence the Republicans gave us the repeal of Glass-Steagall, while the Democrats are fully backing the wonderful actions of the FED. :rolleyes:
Regulatory capture is still very much the law of the land.
Jan. 16 (Bloomberg) -- President Barack Obama defended his plan to “collect every dime” of taxpayer bailout money from as many as 50 major financial institutions and promised enactment of legislation to crack down on practices that led to the financial crisis...
...Republicans called the levy a politically motivated proposal that aimed at an unpopular industry that would end up hurting most citizens.
“It’s nothing more than another tax on the American public,” Michael Steele, chairman of the Republican National Committee, said...
Politics is politics. If the Democrats cannot figure out how to tar the Republican machine with the reputation as supporters of a dishonest, uncaring and greed-filled banking system that has cost Americans their jobs and homes, then they are more incompetent that I imagined. The Republicans are making it easy for the Orator in Chief to take the advantage, but so far he's proved far too tentative and conciliatory - and so has his Party.
President Obama’s milquetoast, watered-down, belated plan to regulate the banking industry was inexplicably labeled “too grande” by Senate Banking Chairman Christopher Dodd.
The chairman of the Senate Banking Committee warned on Tuesday that the Obama administration’s new proposals to rein in Wall Street firms ran the risk of derailing months of delicate negotiations over overhauling financial regulations.
“It’s not a movable feast,” the chairman, Christopher J. Dodd, told Paul A. Volcker, the former Federal Reserve chairman, who has become an influential outside adviser to President Obama. “It’s adding to the problems of trying to get a bill done,” he said at the end of a hearing on the proposals, after all the other committee members had already left.
Mr. Dodd, Democrat of Connecticut, added that the administration was “getting precariously close” to excessive ambition for the legislation. “I don’t want to be in a position where we end up doing nothing because we tried to do too much,” he said.
Thus, Dodd proves that the only thing more corrupt than a congressperson whoring for a campaign donations to get re-elected is a congressperson not seeking re-election, whoring for a job.
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