In October 1948, President Harry Truman was stumping Minnesota, on behalf of both his own successful re-election campaign and a Senate bid by then Minneapolis mayor, Hubert Humphrey. During an appearance in St. Paul on the 13th, Truman delivered an address at the Municipal Auditorium which was carried nationally on radio.
The same information can be presented in different ways to create or bolster different narratives. A Quinnipiac poll came out this morning and much of the establishment media presented it like this:
Just before Tuesday's vote to further gut Dodd-Frank and open the U.S. up to another bankster greed-driven economic catastrophe, Orange County law professor and congressional candidate Katie Porter wrote to her supporters that "As a consumer protection attorney, I've spent nearly 20 years fighting powerful special interests like Wall Street lobbyists. I've collaborated extensively with Elizabeth Warren on ways to protect the middle class from being scammed by powerful institutions and corporations. Unfortunately, I have to alert you to a new attack on consumers coming later this week.
Looks like I stumbled onto something Saturday-- my use of the term "Bailout Caucus," pissed off some senators. Turns out the polite way of talking about the topic is to refer to the "Bank Lobbyist Act." My bad.
Tonight I want to talk about the SIFI Threshold, That';s because I had lunch with my old friend Roberto Rodriguez-- former congressional candidate and later special assistant for legislative affairs to the Secretary of the Treasury (Geithner at the time). So what's SIFI? Don't worry, I didn't know either til Roberto explained it over a bowl of pasta.
Republicans and "Democrats" from the Republican wing of the Democratic Party are drawn to the House Financiall Services Committee like flies to shit. It's the congressional honeypot through which millions and millions of dollars in bribes moves from Wall Street into the political system every year. The banksters and their lobbyists pay big money to the members of the committee for their... cooperation.
I wouldn't call Comey's testimony yesterday "a distraction," but it sure did distract a lot of people from watching the Dodd-Frank repeal debate in the House that was going on roughly at the same time. The Republicans passed it 233-186. Every Republican voted for it except Walter Jones (R-NC) and all the Democrats who voted, voted NO.
Zach Carter is one of Huff Po's most perceptive reporters and yesterday he warned his readers that while we were all distracted by the clown show Trump had finally delivered one on big campaign promise-- not for his voters, of course, but for his Wall Street donors-- he pretty much gutted Dodd-Frank.
While everyone was preoccupied with the Republican circus around TrumpCare yesterday, Congress' most corrupt committee, House Financial Services, took another step toward gutting the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. In fact, what they did yesterday would even gut some protections that were in placer before the Great Recession. The votes were basically along party lines to send Hensarling's Wall Street lobbyist-written legislation to the full House.
Congress has written the bribery laws in such a way as to exclude their own habitual behavior of taking corporate bribes. There are many examples but one that always stands out is how members of congress relate to the predatory payday lenders whose business model is ripping off the public Congress is supposed to be protecting.
