McCaskill’s Donor at the Fed

Claire McCaskill has suggested that she will oppose the Fed audit admendment. This represents a flip-flop, as the Senator from Missouri voted for the Fed audit back in April. One possible explanation for the shift: one of McCaskill’s top donors is Steven H Lipstein, chair of the St Louis Federal Reserve. Lipstein has given McCaskill …

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Dodd’s Decision to Retire Likely Doomed Financial Reform Bill

When Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Connecticut) announced last January that he would not seek reelection, some media outlets declared that Dodd’s retirement would actually increase the chances that robust financial regulatory reform would be enacted (for example, see articles by The Washington Post and BusinessWeek). Such analyses demonstrate a near total ignorance of the processes of …

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NYT: Investigate Goldman and Geithner counselor Lee Sachs

In an editorial today, the New York Times calls for an investigation of Goldman Sachs and other financial firms for placing large bets against securities that they bundled and sold to clients. Titled “Betting against all of us,” the editorial was prompted by an article by Gretchen Morgenson and Louise Story that appeared in the …

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Bean and New Democrats Linked to Key Wall Street Lobby

Last week LittleSis reported that Rep. Melissa Bean receives significant support from the Wall Street interests who helped weaken new financial reform legislation. One such supporter is the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association (SIFMA), Wall Street’s primary lobbying organization. SIFMA funds many of the New Democrats who helped pass the Bean amendment, as well …

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Melissa Bean’s backers are key Obama associates

A group of “New Democrats” led by Representative Melissa Bean has reportedly won major concessions in the financial reform fight: The compromise reached late Wednesday between pro-reform House Democrats and the banker-friendly wing of the party could significantly weaken consumer protection in states where lawmakers support tougher rules against tactics such as predatory lending and …

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Deregulation was so much more fun!

Senator Dodd chose an interesting time to release his financial reform bill. Ten years ago this week, Republicans and Democrats joined hands to gut the Depression-era banking reforms known as “Glass-Steagall.” This helped pave the way for the Wall Street-induced economic disaster we are currently experiencing. At the time, the reformers were quite pleased with …

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