Stop the Madness! Stop the Corker Bank Bailout Sellout

by Jim Hoft

Do Republicans Not Get It? Did they not pay attention to the thousands of tea parties this past year? Did they not see the hundreds of thousands of tea party protesters across the nation? Did they miss the million protesters who marched down the streets of Washington DC on September 12th?


(Photo via Instapundit and Mary Katharine Ham)

Are the Republicans really that blind? Do they Not Care? Even awful Speaker Pelosi is warming up to the Nazis tea party protesters.

After all of the posturing and preening and shouting and yelling and marching and tea party protesting, America is about to get the whole Democrat agenda shoved down our collective throat. Barack Obama announced today that Democrats are going to use reconciliation to jam Obamacare through Congress and essentially nationalize one-sixth of the US economy. And now, Republicans are about to offer them the rest of the American economy on a silver platter thanks to Senator Bob Corker. Congress is currently working to create a whole new consumer protection division within the Federal Reserve. This new division will give the Fed more power and focus on consumer protection. And, a Republican, Bob Corker, is for some reason leading the charge to create this whole new bureaucracy. The Wall Street Journal reported:

Several senior Republicans have joined negotiations with Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd (D., Conn.) over how to construct consumer-protection rules, potentially bringing more Republican votes to a broader revamp of finance rules—if Democrats can stomach more concessions.

“We’re very, very, very close to a deal,” Sen. Bob Corker (R., Tenn.) said in an interview.

The development came after a closed door meeting Tuesday night between Mr. Corker and Sens. Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.), Richard Shelby (R., Ala.), Judd Gregg (R., N.H.), and Mike Crapo (R., Idaho).

The meeting was called after a Wall Street Journal story Tuesday said Messrs. Corker and Dodd were near an agreement on a compromise to create a new consumer protection division within the Federal Reserve…

…On Wednesday, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and White House senior advisor Valerie Jarrett met with consumer and public interest groups and said new consumer protection rules would be formidable.

At the meeting, Mr. Geithner said it was an “empty argument” that safety and soundness regulation couldn’t be separated from consumer protection, someone familiar with the meeting said. Treasury officials also said they would only support new rules if the agency had an independent leadership, budget and decision making powers, and the power to set rules and enforce them.

Grassroots conservatives are rightly up in arms over Senator Corker’s game of footsie with far left Democrat Chris Dodd on President Obama’s effort to impose a massive new regulatory scheme on America’s economy. Dodd, of course, is one of the architects of the current financial crisis. His decades long support of ACORN, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and the Community Reinvestment Act should have disqualified him from these negotiations in the first place. But, this is Washington, after all, and apparently Bailout Bob was willing to look the other way and turn the other cheek.

This was even after the House of Representatives passed a similar bill in December, but it received no Republican votes. Close to two dozen Democrats voted against it.

The House passed financial reform bill, crafted by none other than Barney Frank (D-MA) contained a permanent bailout fund for banks and Wall Street firms and created a new agency of government that would be allowed to regulate any and all business in America. It received no Republican votes and close to two dozen democrats opposed the legislation. But, it is alive today thanks to Bob Corker.

The ironically named Consumer Financial Protection Agency will pile a new bureaucracy on top of an existing bureaucracy. It will spend hundreds of millions of dollars imposing job killing regulations on small business. It will have the power to strip consumers of their freedoms and restrict credit opportunities for small business. And, there’s more. Also tucked in the bill is a clause that gives the Federal Reserve the authority to bailout businesses to the tune of an astonishing $4 trillion.

The bill seemed to be dead until Corker decided to grab favorable headlines from the New York Times. According to news reports, Corker’s solution to the problem is to move the new regulatory agency to the Federal Reserve as opposed to leaving it a stand alone agency. Corker is misleading his colleagues and the public by telling them that this will some how save money.

Let’s be clear, the bill contains bailouts for big banks and Wall Street firms and new red tape nightmares for main street businesses. What difference does the location of this new uber-regulatory bureaucracy make? The only thing this bill will save is jobs, paychecks, yachts and third vacation homes for Wall Street bankers and irresponsible CEOs.

The fact is we need to reduce the size and scope of government not allow a government takeover of the financial sector of the economy.

The word from the halls of the Capital is Corker is still trying to cut a deal. But, honestly, what can conservatives possibly get from such a deal? If you strip out the bailouts and the new Washington bureaucracies and regulations, there is nothing left. So, any deal will be a bad one. A quick look at Corker’s financial contributors leaves one wondering whether Corker supports Wall Street more than Main Street. He is giving those at the top a handout while giving the middle class the bill. And as far as the tea party movement. Corker will forfeit any political ground conservatives have gained back recently.

Call Bob Corker and tell him to Stop the Madness. (202) 224-3344


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Posted Mar 4th 2010 at 8:44 am in Congress, Economics, Featured Story, News, Politics | 81 Comments