Clinton And Gingrich Now Say It Was A Mistake To Help Wall Street End Glass-Steagall

Wall Street made it clear to the political class they would pay-- and pay big-- to get out from under the restrictions of Glass-Steagall. They tried all during the Reagan and the Bush I years but it wasn't 'til the right had the disgraced Bill Clinton by the balls that they were able to get what they wanted. Conservative Democrat turned reactionary Republican, Texas Senator Phil Gramm, one of the most corrupt Members of Congress in the entire 20th Century, teamed up with conservative Republicans Jim Leach (IA) and Tom Bliley (VA) to help Wall Street game the system in such a way that they could be sure to drain immense wealth from the middle class.

Although the bill passed the Senate 54-44, with only one Democratic vote-- ultra conservative corporate shill Ernest Hollings (SC)-- 2 months later it passed the House with overwhelming bipartisan support, 343-86. During the debate, one of the Democrats voting NO, John Dingell (MI) warned that if it passed the Wall Street-controlled banks would become "too big to fail" and that it would only be a matter of time before taxpayers would be bailing out predatory banksters. [Speaking of predatory banksters, as soon as Gramm-- whose wife Wendy was on the Board of Directors of Enron but never went to prison-- delivered the legislation, he left the Senate and... became a bankster, of course. Right now he's the Vice Chairman of UBS's investment bank.]

With Clinton, who signed the bill, and Gingrich, who supported the bill as Speaker-- but had been driven from office in a series of sordid scandals a few months before the vote-- now admitting what a mistake they had made, let's take a look at some of the key players from 1999 and see where they are today. Like Gramm, Harold Ford (D-TN), a big supporter, now works as a bankster himself and Wall Street tv shill. I'm not sure where Rob Blagojevich (D-IL) is now-- in prison?--but he voted for the bill, as did Tom DeLay (R-TX), who has also been sentenced to prison but has managed to avoid serving any time. Two other big boosters, Duke Cunningham (R-CA), who is in prison, and Bob Ney (R-OH), who served some time and is out now, are unlikely to ever run for office again. Dick Armey (R-TX) was a key player in passing the bill and he's getting a fat paycheck from the Koch brothers today to run the Tea Party for them. Congressmen who voted yes and then found themselves the recipients of huge amounts of Wall Street money to finance their career jumps to the Senate include these egregiously corrupt senators:

Roy Blunt (R-MO)- $4,812,944
Richard Burr (R-NC)- $3,874,328
Susan Collins (R-ME)- $2,431,440
Jim DeMint (R-SC)- $2,895,397
Lindsay Graham (R-SC)- $2,235,575
Johnny Isakson (R-GA)- $4,792,431
Robert Menendez (D-NJ)- $5,222,119
Rob Portman (R-OH)- $3,966,426
Jim Talent (R-MO), defeated after one term- $3,515,804
John Thune (R-SC)- $4,650,253
Pat Toomey (R-PA)- $3,036,265
David Vitter (R-LA)- $2,866,054
Roger Wicker (R-MS)- $1,592,269

Other boosters of killing Glass Steagall who went on to political grandeur include Spencer Bachus (R-AL), the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, John Boehner (R-OH), now Speaker of the House, Nathan Deal (R-GA), now Governor of Georgia, Denny Hastert (R-IL), former Speaker of the House, Steny Hoyer (D-MD), the # Democrat in the Democratic House leadership, John Kasich (R-OH), current Governor of Ohio, Buck McKeon (R-CA), Chairman of House Armed Services Committee, Paul Ryan (R-WI), chairman of the House Budget Committee, Joe Scarborough (R-FL), current TV right-wing talk show host, Chris Shays (R-CT), current candidate for the Senate, Fred Upton (R-MI), current Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee and a Member of the SuperCommittee.

So who voted NO, in the House? Nancy Pelosi didn't vote. Among the no-votes were Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), a candidate for Senate now, Sherrod Brown (D-OH), now a senator, Tom Coburn (R-OK), now a senator, John Conyers (D-MI), Barney Frank (D-MA), Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), Ray LaHood (R-IL), now the Secretary of Transportation, Barbara Lee (D-CA), John Lewis (R-GA), Jerry Nadler (D-NY), Ron Paul (R-TX), Bernie Sanders (I-VT), now a senator, Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), Maxine Waters (D-CA), Henry Waxman (D-CA).

Compare the lists. One is mostly bad guys who support the 1% and the other is mostly good guys who try to protect the 99% against the predators from within the 1%. Shame voters don't pay attention to history, isn't it? Brad Miller, a senior Democrat on the House Financial Services Committee-- and one of Congress' staunchest supporters of ordinary working families-- does pay attention to history. Brad is one of the most consistently thoughtful Members of the House. I called him this morning because his primary opponent-- Rep. David Price-- often votes with the Republicans on matters of interest to the 1% and, predictably, Price voted for deregulation and to end Glass-Steagall. Brad wasn't in Congress at the time but everything about his record supports his claim that he would have voted against Gramm-Leach-Bliley. This is what he had to say about it today:

"All the serious, sophisticated people back in the nineties said that Glass-Steagall was an anachronism, that everything then was completely different from the 1920s, and only the populist rabble thought we still needed to separate investment and commercial banking. Score another one for the populist rabble. Repealing Glass-Steagall and the other financial deregulation votes in the nineties obviously was largely responsible for the financial crisis and the enormous shift of wealth from working and middle-class families to the financial sector."

So that's why Alan Grayson endorsed him-- and why Blue America did as well. We need more men and women in Congress like Brad Miller-- and fewer who just go along to get along and do whatever Steny Hoyer tells them to.