Tea-Publican senators aid and abet the predatory banksters of Wall Street

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

The Tea-Publicans really hate Elizabeth Warren, the Harvard Law professor who chaired the Congressional Oversight Panel for TARP bailout money to the banksters of Wall Street, and who currently serves as Assistant to the President and Special Advisor to the Secretary of the Treasury on the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

Tea-Publicans are trying to kill the Consumer Financial Protection Burea to aid and abet the predatory banksters of Wall Street. These Randian bedwetters want the predatory banksters of Wall Street to be able to rob you without any "government regulations" or "accountability" for their crimes — back to their "free market" ways before the financial collapse of September 2008 and the destruction of our economy. This is insane! Republicans Make Power Play To Gut Consumer Financial Protection Bureau:

[Forty four of 47 Tea-Publican senators] have signed on to a letter threatening to filibuster any nominee to head the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau unless it is dramatically weakened. Read it here.

"We will not support the consideration of any nominee, regardless of party affiliation, to be the CFPB director until the structure of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is reformed," reads a letter, co-authored by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL), ranking member of the Banking Committee.

Congress created the CFPB, despite GOP opposition, as part of the Wall Street reform law, to protect consumers from predatory actors in the financial industry. Its intellectual godmother is Elizabeth Warren, whom President Obama has tasked with standing up the agency. Despite her popularity, she's been a long-shot to run the Bureau when it officially launches — largely because of financial industry and Republican (and even some Democratic) opposition. Indeed, former Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd (D-CT) — who poured cold water on the idea of nominating Warren — warned that if Democrats tried to jam a director through the Senate without bipartisan support, Republicans would go to war against the Bureau and try to gut it.

Turns out that's what's happening anyhow. Who could've predicted?

Specifically, Republicans want the CFPB subject to the appropriations process — something it avoids as an entity housed in the Federal Reserve. They also want to delegate more decision making authority away from the Bureau's director, and give other regulators — many of which are captured by the financial industry — opportunities to block CFPB rules.

The financial reform law is popular, and the CFPB is the most popular part of it. President Obama could use a recess appointment to fill the vacancy, and take this fight public.

This is a fight the president and Democrats must fight. And for godssake, the Department of Justice has to start prosecuting the banksters of Wall Street. "Somebody's going to emergency, somebody's going to jail."

UPDATE: It appears the Tea-Publicans haven't yet received the memo from their bankster bosses. Has Elizabeth Warren Won Over the Banks? | Mother Jones:

This week, Camden Fine, president and CEO of the influential Independent Community Bankers Association, told a gathering of 1,000 bankers that the odds Obama would nominate Warren were "better than even," later remarking to American Banker that "you would have to look favorably on a [Warren] nomination because clearly she understands our model." Frank Keating, the head of the American Bankers Association, told a reporter that the ABA would support Warren if she were confirmed as CFPB director by the Senate. And Robert Palmer, who heads the Community Bankers Association of Ohio, captured the mood of small banks when he told Bloomberg Businessweek that if Warren "leaves, and the direction changes, we're not going to be very receptive."

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The warming to Warren is due, in large part, to a months-long outreach campaign aimed at members of the banking industry.

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The charm offensive appears to be paying off—and at precisely the right time.

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To be sure, huge hurdles remain between Warren and the nomination. Republicans in Congress almost universally oppose her nomination.

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But even if Warren only wins over some bankers and not others, leaving the industry conflicted on her nomination, that's could actually be a victory. "There was universal opposition to Dodd-Frank," says a person who's worked closely with Warren in the past. "There was universal opposition to Warren getting the bureau started. At the end of the day, if the banking industry is fractured on her nomination, that's just fine."