Democrats Soften Financial Bill

[WriteDown]

Source: WSJ

WASHINGTON -- Congressional Democrats and the White House are softening some elements of the Obama administration's proposal to overhaul financial-market supervision as they begin a push to win broader support for the bill.

So far, Democrats and the White House haven't budged on the main tenets of the effort, which include tougher regulation of the country's largest financial companies and the creation of a new agency to protect consumers. But the changes are nonetheless significant and could eliminate some of the more polarizing aspects of the plan.

Republicans remain opposed to many parts of the proposal, and Democrats will have to count on broad support from within their ranks. Some of the changes reflect ideas pushed by conservative Democrats, which suggests an effort to ensure the party lines up behind the bill.

House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank (D., Mass.) told lawmakers the plan would no longer require banks to offer customers "plain vanilla" versions of products such as mortgages and credit cards, one of the more populist components of the White House's proposal that had become a lightening rod of criticism from conservative Democrats, Republicans and business groups.

He also said he would limit the types of companies that could face scrutiny by a proposed Consumer Financial Protection Agency by excluding real-estate brokers, accountants, retailers and others that aren't banks or financial-services companies. Rep. Frank said he felt that in some areas the White House had "overdrafted" the bill.....



Read more: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB125371201220533929.html?mod=igoogle_wsj_gadgv1&

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As expected.

[joeycola]

1. The majority are corporists!!--yes, even the Dems!!

[WriteDown]

2. They have bodies?

As in corporeal?

I don't want any non-corporeal entities in Congress.

[Democrats_win]

3. Blue Dog's "New Deal" for the banks. Raw deal for you.

[No Elephants]

7. Barney Frank is no blue dog. This is what passes for the "left of the left" these days.

[Metta]

4. Trading away our safety for their profit. Happy karma.

... don't get me started.

[IthinkThereforeIAM]

5. You are lucky if you get 50% of what you want in politics...

...so it would appear that they added the "real-estate brokers, accountants, retailers and others that aren't banks or financial services companies" as bargaining chips. Perhaps by tactfully dropping some or all of these "extra" chips, they will sooth some GOP egos(haha) and be able to claim "we gave you a bunch of fricken bones, so quit whining" when it comes down to committee approval of the bill/amendments/clauses/earmarks.

[debbierlus]

6. The bill was too weak from the start. Diluting it further will only gurantee

The same status quo will prevail, and that will have devastating consequences to any long term economic recovery. We just gave them several trillion dollars and they dictate the law.

Fascism at its finest.

[saracat]

8. I agree.

[No Elephants]

9. Which is why you start off a bill with at least 200% of your real bottom line.

So-called liberal or progressive Democrats have become all too practiced at taking things off the table before any one else even walks into the kitchen.

Why do you think that is?

[4_TN_TITANS]

10. If the Dems can regain power in 2010

we'll make some real changes! :sarcasm:

[high density]

11. The items that were dropped were virtually worthless

Do people not trust Barney Frank now? I mean come on folks.