But the icing on the cake is classic Washington insider nonsense that is right up there with being "for the war before being against it." The crusty Senator Shelby managed to say with a straight face that every GOP member of the committee voted against the bank reform but they were somehow not polarized. Uh huh. At this point it's quite clear that the GOP will say "no" to anything the Democrats propose even when it moves out of committee. It's also obvious that the GOP is there to support the bankers and there deep pocketed lobbyists to block any reform that may be good for consumers.
The Democrats are missing an easy target if they fail to make an issue of the Republicans support for the bankers who brought down the global economy. The Republicans still are much too comfortable with the positions related to being obstacles to Wall Street reform. If they can't even support this water-down proposal that includes their key idea of letting the Fed control consumer protection, it's a mystery what they need to agree to anything. MarketWatch:
After less than half an hour of discussion, a Senate panel late Monday approved sweeping bank-reform legislation to rewrite the rules for capitalism and banking without any Republican support, after GOP lawmakers on the committee decided not to include any amendments to the measure.Maybe outside of the Beltway, "bipartisan" means something else.
Senators voted 13 to 10 to pass the underlying 1,336-page bill introduced last week by Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., the chairman of the Senate Banking Committee.
Dodd reached an agreement to have no Democratic amendments be considered, as part of an effort to reach a compromise with Republicans to create a bipartisan bill before it comes up for a Senate vote.
