Elizabeth Warren Calls Out Republican Opposition

Elizabeth Warren calls out Republicans for trying to stall financial regulation: "Blocking Rich Cordray is about keeping the game rigged so that consumers remain in the dark — and a few bad actors can rake in big profits."

But let’s take a step back here for a moment to appreciate exactly how un-politician-like Sen. Warren is acting when  she makes speeches like this.  President Obama passed over Warren in naming Cordray to head the CFPB — even though she was the driving force behind the agency’s creation – because the administration was concerned that she was too outspoken to get confirmed in the Senate. (Obviously, as it turns out, it really didn’t matter whom Obama nominated because Republicans are blocking Cordray anyway.)

In other words, Warren’s support for Cordray despite being passed over for his position for being too awesomeoutspoken gains her nothing politically. She’s just doing it because she genuinely believes in stopping financial institutions from causing another recession. Perhaps my expectations have become a bit low, but I find this exceedingly impressive coming from an elected official.

Warren went on to point out that, although government regulation is always a controversial subject, federal agencies actually have an excellent history of protecting consumers:

It’s thanks to federal agencies that no one has to worry that those white pills are baking soda instead of antibiotics or that the paint on the baby’s crib is laced with lead.

Because look, no one likes regulation. No one likes “government red tape,” as lobbyists have skillfully spun it. But you know what people like even lessthan government red tape? World wide financial meltdowns. Dying of a bacterial infection. Babies getting lead paint poisoning.

If it takes a little red tape to take care of those things, I’m okay with that.

So God Made A Banker

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And on the eighth day God looked down on his planned paradise and said, “I need someone who can flip this for a quick buck.”

So God made a banker.

God said, “I need someone who doesn’t grow anything or make anything but who will borrow money from the public at 0% interest and then lend it back to the public at 2% or 5% or 10% and pay himself a bonus for doing so.”

So God made a banker.

God said, “I need someone who will take money from the people who work and save, and use that money to create a dotcom bubble and a housing bubble and a stock bubble and an oil bubble and a commodities bubble and a bond bubble and another stock bubble, and then sell it to people in Poughkeepsie and Spokane and Bakersfield, and pay himself another bonus.”

So God made a banker.

God said, “I need someone to build homes in the swamps and deserts using shoddy materials and other people’s money, and then use these homes as collateral for a Ponzi scheme he can sell to pensioners in California and Michigan and Sweden. I need someone who will then foreclose on those homes, kick out the occupants, and switch off the air conditioning and the plumbing, and watch the houses turn back into dirt. And then pay himself another bonus.”

God said, “I need someone to lend money to people with bad credit at 30% interest in order to get his stock price up, and then, just before the loans turn bad, cash out his stock and walk away. And who, when asked later, will, with a tearful eye, say the government made him do it.”

God said, “And I need somebody who will tell everyone else to stand on their own two feet, but who will then run to the government for a bailout as soon as he gets into trouble — and who will then use that bailout money to help elect a Congress that will look the other way. And then pay himself another bonus.”

So God made a banker.