Apparently, Democrats aren’t the only ones who use Twitter to harass women. ...Joe Nocera, NYT
Nocera is referring to the harrassment, pure and simple, of Elizabeth Warren.
Elizabeth Warren will return to the torture chamber known as the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform on July 14. Earlier this week, Darrell Issa, the California Republican who is chairman of the committee, tweeted the news.
The prospective loss of Elizabeth Warren to the oversight of Wall Street on behalf of American consumers and account holders is huge. It will take something huge to a) get Democrats to act deliberately and forcefully, and b) to motivate independents to move left, muttering "enough is enough."
Something else that might help: 70% of Americans don't trust banks as far as they can throw them. The more banks and Washington are perceived to be partners in the deception and ruination of voters, the worse it will get for those Republicans and right wing Democrats.
Ezra Klein wrote about this the other day in WaPo.
Republicans aren’t content with blocking anyone and everyone from leading the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Next week, they’re planning to attach a series of anti-Dodd-Frank amendments to a noncontroversial economic development bill. One amendment would neuter the CFPB, of course. Gotta keep trying, I guess. Another would repeal the whole law. A third would stop the government identifying too-big-to-fail firms and regulating them more tightly. And that doesn’t even get into the ongoing efforts to defund the agencies that need to implement the various regulations, or the language in the GOP budget repealing the government’s authority to dismantle firms that are about to detonate the financial system.
One possibility here is that I Rip Van Winkled it for a bit and banks got really popular while I was snoring under a tree. So I asked Gallup. The answer? Nope. Wall Street’s got the sort of poll numbers usually reserved for the guy who ran over your dog when you were a kid, or the boss who fired you from your first job. Almost 70 percent of Americans think they’ve got too much power in Washington. That’s four points below the much-beloved lobbyist class and tied with “major corporations.” Allying with the banks is not how you get ahead in American politics. ...Ezra Klein
As for Warren, Republicans are hard put to find a solid basis on which to block her appointment. They tried to hang a charge of something like collusion with states attorneys. Turns out she was just doing her job as a federal official. Then there's the issue of whether she's a good enough manager to run the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau.
When she was first appointed to set up the agency, I heard rumbling that she had no management chops and would make a hash of things. This prediction has turned out to be spectacularly wrong. She has attracted first-rate talent for virtually all the top jobs. The new bureau’s first move was to persuade two government agencies to combine mortgage forms into one easy-to-read document — no easy task given how government works. She has consistently talked about making bank disclosures easier for consumers to understand. ...Joe Nocera
So what's Obama doing to make sure his appointee gets the job? You guessed. Nada. Zip.
...The president’s response has been to dither. Despite the impending start date for the bureau — and despite the fact that Warren is the clear and obvious choice to run it — he still hasn’t been able to pull the trigger. For months, there were rumblings that he would name Warren in a “recess appointment,” which wouldn’t require Senate confirmation. But that is simply not going to happen: There are parliamentary maneuvers that will allow the Senate to remain “in session” even when there are no actual senators in the vicinity.
Besides, this is a president who sees himself as a consensus-seeker. His first instinct is to try to cut a deal. Thus it was that just a few days ago, the White House floated the name of Raj Date as a possible compromise candidate. Date is one of Warren’s terrific hires; he’s a former banker who, in recent years, has been a vocal consumer advocate. McConnell, however, quickly shot down the idea, and stuck to his guns: no structural changes, no director. End of story.
In politics, there are certainly times when compromise is the right approach. But this is not one of those times. ...Joe Nocera
Right. It's not in the Constitution, but I think there are times when decent citizens should go to Washington, grab the president by the shoulders and give him a good shaking. This is one of those times.
What are Democrats up to these days?
Same old, same old?
Nada? Zip?
