Bernie Sanders's breakup wouldn't fix Wall Street Bloomberg

[NCTraveler]

In some quarters of the Democratic Party, apparently, it's no longer enough to call for the breakup of the big banks: You have to pledge to do it faster than your rivals. That may explain Bernie Sanders's promise on Tuesday to "break 'em up" within his first year in office.

This is hardly a model of thoughtful policymaking. For one, the government is not the best judge of how financial institutions could be efficiently divided. Beyond that, even smaller and more focused institutions can cause a lot of damage, as the 2008 demise of Lehman Brothers (a pure investment bank) and the savings and loan debacle of the 1980s eloquently demonstrate. A common factor was their inability to handle losses.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/sns-wp-blm-bg-editorial-sanders-20b0d4f2-b548-11e5-8abc-d09392edc612-20160107-story.html

Sanders is starting to get more press coverage. Unfortunately, this is what it looks like when you are a Democrat. It's a great day to be a part of the Democratic Party.

[mmonk]

1. Teddy Roosevelt is disappointed.

Question: are we ready to bail them out again for trillions in derivatives?

[Motown_Johnny]

2. In conjunction with his regulatory reforms it is a good start.

Bloomberg as a source for the truth about Wall Street reform.

If it wasn't so sad it would be funny.

[berni_mccoy]

4. Hillary supporters promoting Bloomberg's opinion on Finance

Should be no surprise here its what Hillary would do.

[berni_mccoy]

3. Thanks but I'll take Rob Reich's opinion over fucking Bloomberg's

[Thinkingabout]

5. It makes the hedge fund super pac ads against Hillary a good

Response to Hillary's agenda on enhancing Dodd Frank and invoking the Volcker rule will regulate Wall Street much stronger than re-instating Glass Stegall. Also under Hilary's plan if the banks starts to fail they will be broken up.

[winter is coming]

6. "the government is not the best judge of how financial institutions could be efficiently divided"

Sounds like the fox wants to hold on to his cushy henhouse-guarding job.

[jeff47]

7. :facepalm:

Beyond that, even smaller and more focused institutions can cause a lot of damage, as the 2008 demise of Lehman Brothers (a pure investment bank) and the savings and loan debacle of the 1980s eloquently demonstrate. A common factor was their inability to handle losses.

And with Lehman, those losses were passed on to federally-insured institutions who bought derivatives from Lehman (or other institutions who bought from Lehman, or other institutions who bought from other institutions who bought from.......)

Also, the S&L crisis and its much, much smaller impact on the economy demonstrate exactly what Sanders is aiming for - failures will happen but be contained to relatively small parts of the financial industry. Instead of the Clinton model of failures spreading to the entire industry when "Cut it out" proves insufficient.