Robert Reich: The Obama Administration's Approach ... Will Do 'Nothing' To Change Wall Street

[laughingliberal]

Former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich blasted the Obama administration's approach to financial reform on Sunday. After Obama's top economic adviser, Larry Summers, said on ABC's "This Week" that "reform is going to pass," Reich responded as part of a roundtable that Summers and his colleagues have been part of the problem.

"The fact of the matter is that Alan Greenspan and Larry Summers and Bob Rubin all -- if any trio were responsible for deregulating this financial economy, whether you're talking about getting rid of the Glass-Steagall Act that separated commercial banking from investment banking or you're talking about saying to Brooksley Born at the Commodity Trading Commission, no, you may not regulate derivatives, it's those three," Reich said.

"Now, this is my worry. Everybody is enthusiastic -- or everybody who says that they're looking at financial reform is enthusiastic about doing something about the too-big-to-fail problem. But when it comes right down to it, if you look at the details, there is nothing in the hopper right now that is going to fundamentally change the situation so that five or 10 years from now you don't have a few big banks making wild bets with other people's money and then expecting to be bailed out by the federal government."

Video at Link: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/04/04/robert-reich-the-obama-ad_n_524692.html

[msongs]

1. 'nothing' = increase profits, avoid taxes, send jobs to india lol works for wall street nt

[laughingliberal]

3. Yep. Just watching the rerun of Real Time where Maher had Spitzer on

and he was saying, essentially, the same thing. Maher restated a point he keeps trying to make which is we have one party now-the corporate party.

Nothing has changed and we're going to get another sham 'reform.' Then we'll hear all the nauseating talking points: 'sweeping, historic!' :puke:

[jody]

2. Reich is right, 100% right. The corporatist never lose ground in tightening their strangle hold on

the government created by We the People.

[NJmaverick]

6. If you value his opinion

Look, I'm as disappointed with the Democrats' lack of message, plan, strategy, and guts as anyone. They're out to lunch. They're asleep at the wheel. But then I ask myself who "they" are? They're me. I'm a Democrat. They're also that Democratic politician who phoned a while ago to bemoan the Democrats' lack of message, plan, strategy, and guts. And they're many of you. To be a Democrat in America today is to NOT be a Republican, while at the same time NOT wanting to keep Republicans in power by voting for a third-party candidate who'll only draw votes away from a Democrat (I'm still pissed as hell with Ralph). To be a Democrat is to believe in Democracy and not in Oligarchy, which is the form of government we have right now.

http://robertreich.blogspot.com/2006_05_01_archive.html

[jody]

7. I was a Yellow Dog Democrat a decade before Reich so your post is not new to me.

[laughingliberal]

9. As was I and my parents before me

As I recall, though, there was always room to disagree with our party leaders even as we voted for any Democrat on the ticket.

[jody]

11. Disagree! You betcha and I still love cornering a Dem pol and unloading facts on them they wish to

ignore. :hi:

[laughingliberal]

12. That's my kind of Yellow Dog Democrat!

;)

[Warpy]

4. I had the first glimmer of hope when Dodd announced

he was no longer bothering with bipartisanship in committee because all the GOP wanted was more deregulation when it's obvious that is what caused the problem in the first place.

I don't expect much out of this particular Congress, but maybe it will be something a better Congress can build on.

[laughingliberal]

10. Yeah, another bill we can 'build on.'

Meanwhile, the hope of building a life or rebuilding the one they lost is growing dim for millions of people out here. Maybe they can build on it enough for my grandchildren to realize some benefit. Most of them are a few years from high school graduation.

[Warpy]

14. That's about all we're going to get out of this Congress

We can only hope people are angry enough at the teabaggers and tantrum throwing Republicans to vote more of them out this time around.

If not, we're fucked.

[laughingliberal]

15. I hope but if all we get out of it is we keep the Republicans out of power

and keep the current crop of Blue Dogs and corporate Democrats, it's not real inspiring. Sorry, but I'm tired of being hungry and I'm tired of being heartsick at watching my husband struggle at his age to still scrounge enough money up to feed us and I'm tired of being scared every time he gets sick cause I have no way to get him taken care of and I'm tired of making excuses for our lawmakers.

[theoldman]

5. While I may agree with Reich to a degree, change has to start somewhere.

All of should know that the rich control our government regardless of which party is in power. If Obama can make a a small dent early in his administration perhaps a bigger change can follow. Neither Roosevelt or Johnson made the big changes early in their administration.

[laughingliberal]

8. Let's hope it starts in time to save some of our working and middle class

Sure, change has to start somewhere. Would be good if it could start while there was still a chance to get some of the people whose lives have been destroyed by this crisis back on their feet with a chance to start over. Quite a few have already lost everything and many have little hope of finding jobs or owning another house, again. Financial reform of the criminals who are hoarding all the money (our money, btw) is essential. If they choose to loophole it the way they did HCR we're lost out here. People who are still hanging on have the luxury of being 'pragmatic.' A lot of us, though, have seen our lives destroyed. And every giveaway to the crooks who were responsible for the destruction while I scrape up change for gas and dodge another bill collector and worry about my husband's cough for which we can't see a doctor infuriates me.

[DCBob]

13. I suspect they had to compromise the plan to get enough Repubs on board..

to actually have a chance to pass it.

[laughingliberal]

16. Or to keep their campaign donations flowing. nt

[DCBob]

18. That would be the more synical point of view..

I hope and trust that is not the case. I think its just old fashioned give and take politics. You have to negotiate with the other side to get anything done... even if we believe they are wrong.

[laughingliberal]

22. Well, I suppose watching the life my husband and I worked ourselves half to death to try to build

go down the drain in 2 years time only to find ourselves with no access to health care, sleeping on a friend's couch, scraping up odd work to buy food and having long conversations about how people our age can find a strategy for surviving on the streets has made me a tad cynical as I sit and comfort myself that they are just doing what they have to do get anything done. Wake me when they do something that makes a difference for a real person.

[DCBob]

23. I totally understand how you and many others become "synical" .. I get that way too...

I just hope its not true because if it is we are all really screwed.

[laughingliberal]

25. Well, my family was screwed when the housing market tanked

I had just hoped they'd do something to help us get unscrewed. I've given up. If I had known this was how it would all end up, I wouldn't have worked so hard. I could have wound up here without ever lifting a finger.

[DCBob]

27. Sorry to hear that.. I am also near desperation..

I am about to be laid off.. probably on Wednesday.. I am 54 years old and a software engineer.. I suspect I will have a hard time finding similar employment at my age. Not really sure what I am going to do but I am trying to keep optimistic.. but if in a few months I am still unemployed, I suspect I will be synical too. Anyway, hope things work out somehow for all of us. Peace.

[zipplewrath]

17. Will do everything for banking

That the health insurance reform bill did for health CARE

[laughingliberal]

26. +1000 nt

[bvar22]

19. The Obama Administration's Approach ... Will Do 'Nothing' To Change Wall Street

Mission Accomplished!
:party:


The DLC New Team

(Screen Capped from the DLC Website)

[laughingliberal]

24. I have hoped against hope we would see some indication of something resembling a conscience

in this administration but I'm really hitting the wall, now. Warren seems to get it but I see no will in the rest of the White House economic team or the legislative bodies to listen to her or enact any of her ideas. They seem to trot her out now and then to quiet the 'liberals' down. Then, it's back to the broom closet with her while the Goldman Sachs wing of the party gets about the business of serving their masters.

[change_notfinetuning]

28. You're too nice - more like, "Will shill for Wall Street!" IMHO. Doing nothing

just seems so benign, in light of the ongoing "transparency" and actions of people like Melissa Bean, a Rahm Emanuel Congressional "find".

And could you please not post that DLC website screen at dinnertime? It's accomplishing a different mission, unintended by you, I'm sure.

;-)

[laughingliberal]

30. Yes, Melissa Bean's gutting of the bill the House passed seems to have gone largely unnoticed

But we saw lots of posts here with words like, "sweeping," and "historic." Financial reform was already a sham coming out of the House. Now, it's on the the more conservative Senate where we can watch another episode of, "The poor, poor President got the best bill he could with the current Senate."

[amborin]

20. K&R Robert Reich tells the truth about what's occurring

[Better Believe It]

21. K & R

[KG]

29. of course not.

[scarletwoman]

31. This is extremely important. K &r.

[SocialistLez]

32. Is anyone TRULY surprised?

There are VERY few people in Congress working for average Americans.
Vote out all the corporate who*es.

[femrap]

33. Wasn't Reich Sec'y

of Labor under Clinton? He sure let a shitload of jobs go to China under his auspices. He let Wall Street do what it wanted.

Now he is Mr. Liberal. Does he feel guilty now?

I remember being upset with him.

[Karmadillo]

34. Mission Accomplished!!!!

nt

[saracat]

35. Very informative piece. K+R