Sanity in Washington! Martha, get the gun!

God, this woman gives me shivers. I've never read about such a brilliant person, outside of fiction, in my life. Jesus, she should be President!

Elizabeth Warren is the only voice of sanity and reason in Washington today. No DCspeak, no doublethink or dancing around the issue, she puts it right down in plain fucking English. She met with the Financial Services Roundtable, a trade lobby representing banks like JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America, for a luncheon on Wednesday.

The first major speech since her appointment as Assistant to the President and Special Advisor to Treasury, she picks a hostile environment. Right out of the gate she leaps into the lion's den!

Firedoglake's David Dayen plays it out for us in a post today.

She offered a vision of an agency that would not only write new rules for the entire industry, but consolidate and even eliminate existing ones. But instead of an approach based on individual rules (though she vowed to prohibit unfair practices and increase disclosure to the consumer), Warren highlighted an approach based on principles, a vision for how financial services regulation should work. This principles-based approach is actually something the Financial Services Roundtable proposed back in 2007, though I doubt they envision it the same way as Warren.

Here’s how she described it. “Instead of creating a regulatory thicket of ‘thou shalt nots,’” she said, “and instead of using ever more complex disclosures that drive up costs for lenders and provide little help for consumers, let’s measure our success with simple questions. Your first principle is ‘Fair treatment for consumers.’ I’ll paraphrase your explanation of how to tell if that principle has been met: Can customers understand the product, figure out the costs and risks, and compare products in the marketplace? Regulators should be aiming toward the goals you laid out.”

Warren used the example of a credit card agreement. Customers, she said, “should be able to understand the deal, assess the costs and risks, and compare one card to another.” She valued short agreements with basic, easy-to-understand information contained therein, like the interest rate, the penalty terms and any reward offers, that could be read and comprehended in about four minutes.

Any person who can't see how great this lady is should be cast out on an ice floe.

So Mote It Be,
David A.

Working through the Fear

It's 2009 and in a just a few days, Barack Obama will be sworn in as the 44th President of the United States.

There will be a lot of great speeches, lots of promises made and hope will rain down from above. We've worked hard for this moment and we should take a wee bit of time to revel in it.

But its scary out there. Shit just keeps piling up deeper and deeper, day by day. The economy is tanking far worse than people realize, unless you're one of the 'lucky duckies' who've already lost their job. Retailers took a solid blow to the gut this holiday season. The time of year they use to pay for the rest was more than a little disappointing. It was down right brutal.

Fear is growing across all sectors of the country. Manufacturing centers are shutting down. Some are closing for the holidays, others for the season, and some forever. Retailers are cutting back drastically, layoffs are growing stores are closing. Some of the most familiar names in retail will be closing their doors forever. The big box stores who can weather these times will do everything they can to stay profitable. It's an economic Katrina out there.

I have a job. Still. I hope. I've worked for two major corporations the last 15 years. From the trenches, this disaster looks surreal. I see the effect this has on my coworkers and managers. I see the effect it has on the upper level managers that answer to corporate icons. This shit is real and it is going to get worse. There is no stimulus that can come fast enough to help most of the people brought down by this collapse. We are the walking wounded.

People are scared. My parents have seen their retirement funds impacted. They were luckier than most. Some good people, hard working folks who more than earned their golden years, have seen their nest eggs scrambled and eaten by this collapse and nefarious investment goons like Bernie Madoff. There is no place in Hell deep enough for people like him, no punishment too extreme.

I have a lot of faith in Pres. Obama's desire to bring us out of this mess. However, even the most optimistic course of action will not have any effect for months, perhaps years. Realistically, knowing what we know about the bastards in the GOP and the spinelessness of the Democratic leadership, there is little to no reason for much optimism. Pres. Obama will have to fight and fight hard on every front to get some of his recovery plan in place. Pessimism is getting thick as a London fog around here.

Cynics like myself can be irritating but we are useful. We need to be realistic and grounded as we revel in the Inauguration celebration.

The first thing I suggest we do is shortly after the inauguration, march en masse to the Halls of Congress and hold Sen. Reid and Rep. Pelosi's feet to the fire. Sack up or sack out! The times need real fucking leadership, not wimpy capitulation disguised as political manoeuvrings.

The GOP is at its weakest point in a generation. The people are squarely in Obama's corner and the political capital has never been this high. We cannot squander it on pissy little baby steps. We have to be as bold as the man taking the helm. Face down the Republican Leadership. Call them on their bullshit! If they threaten to hold up legislation, let them! Let them face the Wrath of the People. I have my doubts about this. I don't think it's in Harry Reid's DNA to be combative. He's too close to some of the opposition. He's too concerned about how they'll 'feel' about him afterward.

Grow a spine, Senator. If they stand in your way... let them eat your dust as you push by them. The GOP is in no position to control the debate any more. They lost that right on Election Night. Don't give it back to them.

So Mote It Be.
David A.