There's not much difference between the online reports in the Washington Post and McClatchy on yesterday's financial legislation stall. But it's worth comparing what Washington is telling Washington plus some outliers -- and what the Washington bureau of a national newspaper chain is saying to voters in Alaska and North Carolina, Idaho and Missouri, Kansas, and Indiana.
McClatchy is succinct and clear (visibly so, on its website), the Post is messy and slow-loading.
This morning, the report in McClatchy offers fewer links and details, but it looks at the development of financial reform legislation from the point of view of "ordinary, hard-working Americans" to a far greater extent than does the Post. The Post seems mired in the ephemeral political twists and turns in its own neighborhood, and in the language of its own cynical provincialism.
I'll take McClatchy.
The measure is hardly doomed, though, since its fate rests largely on the outcome of compromise talks among top Senate Democrats and Republicans.
The current legislation, written largely by Democrats, is tougher than what passed the House of Representatives in December. It would force big banks to spin off their divisions that trade in exotic financial instruments called derivatives and would prohibit them from proprietary trading for their own account if they trade on behalf of clients.
Consumers would gain a tough cop on the beat to police mortgages, credit cards and other forms of consumer credit through a new Consumer Financial Protection Agency. There also would be a new process allowing the government quickly to dissolve troubled financial institutions that pose a risk to the broader economy.
Republicans, though, are balking. They want more assurances that taxpayers wouldn't be liable for the failures of large institutions.
Though the bill has no provisions for bailouts, GOP leaders insist there are enough loopholes to allow the government to do just that, even though there are several steps in the overhaul bill intended to right a troubled firm before it reaches a toxic state.
Monday's vote promises to turn up the political volume even louder.
Thanks. That's all I need to know for now.
