President Obama unveiled a Reform Plan yesterday that has all the great banking geniuses all a flutter. Obama initially called for closing down the Office of Thrift Supervision because that agency has been totally ineffective. President Obama even wants the Credit Card Companies to change all their gobbily gook unintelligle explanation of charges and make them simple and easy to understand for the average consumer.
The Securities and Exchange Commission, you remember them right – almost lost their aegis over Mutual Funds too! Obama wants some fundamental change with some fundamental oversight and provisions that will allow “Consumers” a go to place to lodge their complaints. That being said, it seems all the entrenched banking people find that a little alarming.
For years, they have being paying off these Agencies and not having a problem one. Remember Bernie Madoff…..his daughter was dating one of the Enforcement guys at the SEC. That’s how bad it can get! When they say that “Organized Crime is in bed with Authorities”……we didn’t know that could be taken so literally. Spinning flax into gold may be next – while having the taxpayer pay for it! It will pay us to pay attention on this reform.
As we can see, those wonderful Banking people are now going to pull out all of their Congressional stops….and favors – and try to stop, neuter or do away with any meaningful reform of anything. This is of course what they do. It is much the same tactics that the big Teacher Unions use…..when actual reform may mean that they would have to change their ways to benefit the students or parents. The concept is: “We don’t need any new government bureaucracy…..we already paid everyone off!”
Well, this is nothing new…but watch who on both sides of the aisle is going to support these banking interests against the needs of the consumers. It will be telling. In the meantime, the bankers will be scrambling, the big Insurance Companies will be scrambling and all the paid off politicians will be re-booking their flights to Tahiti, Fiji and Cambodia……..and sending the bills to those same bankers, who will be taking that money out of each of our pockets in new fees and new percentage rate increases.
Good luck President Obama, we are with you on this one…..but it will be a battle royal. An “Office of Consumer Protection”….what a novel thought. Didn’t our old pal……Ralph Nader want to come up with something like that a few years back? Good grief, what could be next? A Larouche solution to the banking crisis?
We need an Office of Citizen Protection – protection from GOVERNMENT.