Floors Not Ceilings, Stupid - Dave Sirota

[asdjrocky]

"States rights" has been the divisive clarion call of the extreme right on social and civil rights issues for decades. But devolving power to the states doesn't have to be a bad thing. It can be what's known in policy circles as Progressive Federalism - an ideology whereby "governors and activist state attorneys general lead the way on environmental initiatives, consumer protection and other issues," as the New York Times reported in a piece about the Obama administration's support for the idea.
But in order for Progressive Federalism to happen, the federal government has to be supportive of floors not ceilings - that is, oriented toward setting minimum progressive regulatory standards that states must at least comply with, not maximum regulatory ceilings that states are not allowed to go above and beyond. And the problem is that the Democratic Party is split on that idea - because Big Money hates it.

Case in point is the intensifying debate about Wall Street reform. During the era of deregulation, Washington policymakers passed statutes preempting (read: invalidating) many state laws that went further in regulating the banking industry than federal law. Now, a faction of Wall Street-funded "New Democrats" are trying to gut a White House proposal to change that paradigm and establish minimum floors of bank regulation that states can go beyond. According to the Wall Street Journal this Democratic congressional faction is trying to flip the proposal on its head by making the final product establish a federal ceiling whereby states cannot regulate banks any further:

The rest-
http://www.openleft.com/diary/15490/floors-not-ceilings-stupid