Congress Should Change The Name Of The House Financial Services Committee To The Neoliberalism Committee

This is propaganda

Members of Congress mostly sign up for the Financial Services Committee because it's the easiest committee in Congress to sell your vote for big bucks. There are a lot of really corrupt committees, but Financial Services is numero uno. Every now and then a Democrat or two will manage to get on the committee with the express purpose of reforming it. They rarely last long. The out-going chair, Jeb Hensarling (R-TX) is leaving Congress just in time to see control of the committee which from Republicans to Democrats. His legacy is having taken immense amounts of money from the banksters in return for destroying as many regulations on their behavior as he could. These are the bribes he earned-- and how the amount stacked up to other members of the House who were busy taking bribes last year:

• Financial Sector as a whole- $7,905,748 (2nd most)
• Stock brokers and the Investment Industry- $1,536,111 (12th most)
• Finance/Credit companies- $738,104 (#1)
• Hedge Funds- $107,350
• Mortgage Banking- $251,555 (2nd most)
• Payday Lenders- $202,000 (2nd most)
• Commercial Banking- $1,459,388 (the most)
• Savings and Loans- $85,903 (2nd most)

Well now he's gone and the new chair, Maxine Waters (D-CA), doesn't spend her life gobbling up bribes on a level Hensarling did. Hensarling isn't the only Republican who is leaving Congress from the committee. No more payoffs will be flowing to these criminals, in order of seniority and including how much they've taken from the Finance Sector:

• Ed Royce (R-CA)- $7,593,842
• Stevan Pearce (R-NM)- $2,015,512
• Randy Hultgren (R-IL)- $2,368,537
• Dennis Ross (R-FL)- $1,983,567

• Robert Pittenger (R-NC)- $1,367,745
• Keith Rothfus (R-PA)- $2,252,763
• Luke Messer (R-IN)- $1,828,341
• Bruce Poliquin (R-ME)- $2,357,049
• Mia Love (R-UT)- $1,812,806
• Dave Trott (R-MI)- $577,765
• Tom MacArthur (R-NJ)- $1,308,469
• Claudia Tenney (R-NY)- $984,180

• Mike Capuano (D-MA)- $2,686,760
• Keith Ellison (D-MN)- $914,294
• John Delaney (New Dem-MD)- $2,537,077
• Kyrsten Sinema (Blue Dog-AZ)- $4,208,505

I don't know who McCarthy has decided to anoint as the GOP ranking member this year but the three with the most seniority on the committee are Peter King (R-NY- $3,092,721) Frank Lucas (R-OK- $2,483,427) and Patrick McHenry (R-NC- $5,586,542) and it will presumably one of them. McHenry is the most corrupt and I'd bet hell get the job.

OK, while I was researching this I noticed something else. If you want to power-goose the bribes, the subcommittee to be on is Capital Markets, Securities and Investment. OMG! Do these crooks just roll in the cash-- more than anyone else, short of leadership positions. I can't wait to watch which crooked freshmen gravitate towards this one, The chairman was Bill Huizenga (R-MI) and he managed to grab $2,801,450 and the new chair is an incredibly corrupt NYC Democrat, Carolyn Maloney who has taken a startling $6,327,421 from the Finance sector. The Democrats should be ashamed to appoint this crook to chair the subcommittee. But they're not.

These are the Capital Markets, Securities and Investment subcommittee members, the ones who aren't leaving the House (so I won't mention that Kyrsten Sinema, who's going to the Senate accepted $4,208,505 in bribes while serving on this subcommittee) who have taken over a million bucks each from the Finance Sector:

• Carolyn Maloney (D-NY)- $6,327,421

• Jim Himes (New Dem-CT)- $6,279,357
• Steve Stivers (R-OH)- $5,598,776
• Patrick McHenry (R-NC)- $5,586,542
• Brad Sherman (New Dem- CA)- $3,823,403
• Sean Duffy (R-WI)- $3,679,647
• Gregory Meeks (New Dem-NY)- $3,661,288
• David Scott (New Dem-GA)- $3,260,344
• Peter King (R-NY)- $3,092,721
• Ann Wagner (R-MO)- $3,041,599
• Josh Gottheimer (New Dem-NJ)- $2,967,427
• Bill Huizenga (R-MI)- $2,801,450
• Bill Foster (New Dem-IL)- $2,780,919
• French Hill (R-AR)- $2,386,049
• Stephen Lynch (D-MA)- $2,084,356
• Juan Vargas (New Dem-TX)- $1,706,965
• Tom Emmer (R-MN)- $1,333,623

So that leaves us with the freshmen who took the most money from the banksters-- over $700,000-- while they were running. I've never seen a freshman class entering Congress with this kind of a debt to the banksters. And notice-- not one of them is a Republican! These are the ones the banksters are counting on to allow them to go on cheating their customers and ripping off the country:

• Mikie Sherrill (New Dem-NJ)- $1,356,124
• Elissa Slotkin (New Dem-MI)- $1,079,022
• Antonio Delgado (D-NY)- $1,077,633
• Dan McCready (New Dem-NC)- $1,006,825
• Tom Malinowski (New Dem-NJ)- $949,192
• Josh Harder (New Dem-CA)- $946,554
• Susie Lee (New Dem-NV)- $907,303
• Jason Crow (New Dem-CO)- $894,376
• Abigail Spanberger (New Dem-VA)- $793,472
• Elaine Luria (New Dem-VA)- $775,938
• Debbie Mucarsel-Powell (New Dem-FL)- $756,569
• Max Rose (New Dem)- $746,093
• Kim Schrier (New Dem-WA)- $732,502
• Colin Allred (New Dem-TX)- $729,600
• Angie Craig (New Dem-MN)- $710,436
• Mike Levin (D-CA)- $710,273
• Katie Hill (New Dem-CA)- $710,109

17 freshmen who have already taken over $700K from the Finance Sector-- unheard of! And notice that 15 out of the 17 are New Dems, the caucus invented to sell their votes to Wall Street. Lookin' pretty miserable already. And that brings us to an interesting essay that Rainer Shea published on Sunday at the Ghion Journal-- Neoliberalism Is The Rationalization For Corporate Tyranny. It helps to explain the ideology behind the New Dems that even many of them don't fully grok themselves. "To understand the pathologies behind our paradigm of militarism, institutional racism, and extreme inequality," he began, "we should focus not so much on the attitudes of the elites but on the ideology that they use to advance their agendas."

When was the last time we had someone in Congress willing to say anything like this?

He makes the point that neoliberalism-- the extreme version of capitalism-- is the ideology "that the ruling class has made into conventional political thought. And neoliberalism is an exceptionally useful worldview for a power elite to propagate because it gives those who share their ideology the same mindset that the elites themselves have."

Like every dominant class throughout history, the plutocrats see those in the lower rungs of society as inferior. But neoliberalism causes this hostility towards the poor to spread among the broader population. Following in the philosophy of Ayn Rand, and propagated by right-wing pundits like Rush Limbaugh, an attitude has developed among many people that one’s economic position is always their own fault. Resentment towards perceived freeloaders is widespread, with even lower-class people often being suspicious that their economic peers are siphoning off society’s resources through welfare.

When this impulse to blame the country’s decay on laziness and “degeneracy” is fed by the dominant political forces, the ruling elite’s belief in the supreme moral value of wealth and the need for a corporate capitalist “free market” becomes the worldview of much of the rest of society. The super-rich believe that “freedom” means the ability to gain unlimited amounts of wealth without accountability, and this is essentially how most conventional political thinkers also view freedom. The domination of the neoliberal consensus applies to both the mainstream “conservative” and “liberal” sides since the Democratic Party reliably helps Wall Street and large corporations while marginalizing potential progressive reformers.

In reality, our political system is controlled by neither conservatives nor liberals. Electoral politics, government agencies, the courts, the universities, and the media have been bought out by corporations and billionaires. America’s economy is tied in with permanent wars, which are waged to sustain the demands of a global corporate-controlled empire. Our politics and our culture have been subverted by a tiny ruling circle, whose agenda isn’t to advance the traditional definitions of conservatism or liberalism but to protect their own wealth and power. And these elites have gotten many people to rationalize their tyrannical rule-or to even be unaware that a dominating class exists-by branding the accumulation of wealth as a personal freedom that shouldn’t be limited.

This economically centered concept of “freedom” is popularized by giving Americans-- especially white Americans-- the sense that they have the opportunity to succeed in the game of capitalism. Of course, the vast majority of white working class people never become part of the capitalist class. But the promise that they can theoretically become the commanders of the capitalist apparatus is rooted in the Western mentality of individualism, which is psychologically compelling for someone who’s told that the masters of business are society’s deserving “winners.” And the fact that becoming part of the capitalist class would entail domination over society’s “losers” is justified by the darker part of Western culture that glorifies conquest. This aspect of our culture derives from the mentalities behind colonialism and slavery, and it’s now being used to justify our current period of exploitation.

The shallow culture of consumerism enforces this lack of concern for the common good, as well as the regimentation and lack of community that our modern suburban paradigm has created. America’s culture is in a crisis of empathy, where people are encouraged to only think of their own interests while ignoring the circumstances of those who are different from them. Anthropologically, it makes sense for a population in these circumstances to largely be cynical, suspicious of outsiders, and loyal to authority.

...As the clinical psychologist John F. Schumaker recently wrote about the empathy deficit that modern consumerist capitalism has created:

Only the odd diehard biophile or flower child still preaches love as the revolutionary force that could awaken a higher humanity and reverse our death march. People have become less loveable, both in terms of their loveableness and, more crucially, their ability to love.

The lesson is that if we want to make things better, we need to spread compassion and generosity throughout our daily lives. Even more important is the creation of a mass movement that seeks to overthrow corporate capitalism, and then creates a society which protects the planet while ensuring that every person has a safe and comfortable life.

Republicans Stoke White Resentment Over Discrimination In The World Of Car Loans

West Virginia is the Trumpiest state in the union. The PVI is R+19 and Trump beat Hillary 489,371 (68.5%) to 188,794 (26.4%). Trump won every single county in the state. (In the primary, Bernie also won every single county in the state and beat Hillary 124,700 (51.4%) to 86,914 (35.8%). In fact, on primary day, there were plenty of candidates where Bernie took more votes than Trump. West Virginia voters wanted change; they voted for change in the primary-- and took a gamble-- a bad one-- in the general.

Joe Manchin is a very popular politician in West Virginia and his popularity is despite him being a Democrat. so when he votes with the Republicans-- as he often does-- voters back home don't hold it against him. It helps bolster his popularity. Wednesday he took a very bad vote. He was the only Democrat to cross the aisle and vote with the Republicans on a bill that will hurt West Virginia voters. But it won't hurt his reelection chances; it will improve them. It shouldn't.

The Senate voted 51-47 to kill another pieces of Elizabeth Warren's Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. This pieces was a policy warning auto lenders not to discriminate against minority borrowers. An old friend, Karl Frisch, the executive director of Allied Progress, a consumer watchdog group, said that "Many auto dealers are actively discriminating against people of color. This behavior is pervasive, and the CFPB’s guidance would help to end it. They may try to dress it up with political spin, but today the Senate endorsed discrimination."

The Washington Post reported that "The fight centers on guidance issued by the CFPB in 2013 that took aim at a common industry practice that allows auto dealers to mark up interest rates offered by finance companies. Finance firms such as Ally set an interest rate based on objective criteria-- including borrowers’ credit history and the size of their down payments. Auto dealers are then free to raise the interest rates within certain limits. The finance companies and the dealers split the extra profits.

The CFPB argued that auto dealers were using that discretionary markup to charge black and Hispanic borrowers more than white ones, even if they had the same credit scores. Over several years, the agency fined several auto lenders millions of dollars for discriminating against minority borrowers, and some lenders stopped allowing discretionary markups, cutting into auto dealer profits.

The guidance quickly became one of the CFPB’s most controversial campaigns. House Republicans launched a multiyear investigation into the matter, arguing that the CFPB used faulty data to support the policy. The guidance, auto dealers said, made it more difficult to offer consumers discounts on their car purchases out of fear they would be accused of discrimination.

House Republicans are eager to follow suit. The grotesquely crooked chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, Jeb Hensarling (R-TX),-- who sits safely in an uber-gerrymandered district that stretches from Mesquite and the suburbs east of Dallas all the way into the most backward and racist part of the state where Louie Gohmert's, Kevin Brady's and Brian Babin's districts meet (PVI is R+16) turned reality upside down with his statement on stoking white resentment: "Studies showed that the rule could lead to many credit-worthy borrowers paying more for their auto loans."

Antoinette Sedillo Lopez is a former University of New Mexico law professor who has used her legal background to fight for social justice. This outrageous GOP action in the Senate is in her wheelhouse... so I asked her about it. She told me that "If Congress votes to kill these provisions that protect consumers, it is effectively voting to enable discrimination in auto lending. The ECOA (Equal Credit Opportunity Act) exists for the express purpose of preventing the types of systemic discrimination that existed in the industry prior to the CFPB being created. The reversal flies in the face of the overwhelming evidence that when African Americans or Latinos go to purchase a vehicle, dealerships are twice as likely to add a markup to a loan than compared to their white counterparts. Congress should be in the business of protecting consumers and ultimately regulating systemic market problems like these, and not in the business of reversing important evidence-based reforms."

Hopefully, Alan Grayson, no fan of the sleazy kind of racism Hensarling practices, will be back in Congress in January-- working on issues like this again. After the vote he told us flatly that "This reflects a deep divide in America politics and society. You can be for an unfettered 'free market,' or you can be against discrimination, but not both. Many Americans had hoped that we had decisively chosen the latter over the former when we integrated lunch counters, but apparently not."

Wall Street Loses A Top Congressional Ally As Jeb Hensarling Announces His Retirement

Yesterday, Jeb Hensarling announced he is retiring after the current term. It matters because he's been a major player in Wall Street congressional politics. Chairman of the House Financial Services Committee-- he's quitting Congress because this is his last term as chair-- he's taken $7,956,248 from the bankster sector since first being elected in 2002. The only current members of the House who's taken more in bribes from Wall Street are Paul Ryan ($11,479,082) and... no one. Ryan and Hensarling are the two most corrupt, although Ed Royce (R-CA) is close at $7,520,376 and Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy does ok with the banksters as well ($6,942,617). These 4 have been working their hands to the bones to make sure Wall Street can return to the good ole (pre-Dodd-Frank) days of ripping off their customers with impunity... and legal immunity.

Hensarling's district has a PVI of R+16. Obama lost with 37% in 2008 and with 34% in 2012. Hillary-- who won Dallas County (which is about a third of Hensarling's district) with a huge 61-35% landslide-- lost to Trump district-wide by an even bigger landslide in the other direction, 62.7-34.3%. Democrats don't even run against Hensarling. The last Democrat who ran, Linda Mrosko, didn't even get a third of the vote and since then Hensarling's only opposition has been a libertarian with no money at all. Before he announced his retirement there was no Republican challenging him and the Democrat in the race, attorney and former Terrell City Council member Dan Wood, has raised only $27,737. Hensarling ended the 2016 cycle with $648,063 in his campaign account. He's been raising prodigiously since then, having spent nearly $400,000 and sitting on a $1,165,568 campaign warchest today.

War criminal and former Florida congressman Allen West lives in the Dallas area now and he's asking for backers from the far right to push him to get back into Congress. Unfortunately for West, though, there's a homegrown psychopath, state Senator Bryan Hughes of Mineola, who plans on running and is beloved of anyone and everyone to the right of the Tea Party.

Bartlett Naylor, the financial policy expert from Public Citizen’s Congress Watch Division, seemed delighted to see Hensarling retiring. "In the face of extensive Wall Street fraud, abuses and misconduct," he said, "Hensarling has conducted almost no investigative hearings. His sole hearing with failed Wells Fargo CEO John Stumpf only presaged a wasteful probe of the U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the agency that brought the case against the bank for fake accounts. While his own party platform calls for the restoration of the Glass-Steagall separation of lending and speculation, Hensarling has defended the vision of his mentor, former U.S. Sen. Phil Gramm (R-TX), who authored the repeal of this law. With Hensarling’s departure from Congress, lawmakers should reject Wall Street’s agenda in favor of one that puts Main Street first. Polls show that clear majorities, including Independents and Republicans, want tough financial rules that hold Wall Street accountable for its crimes and abuses. Public Citizen’s message to Hensarling: Don’t let the revolving door hit you on the way out."

So... more important than another right-wing dog from Texas finally retiring, who's taking over as head of the House Financial Services Committee? Probably a Democrat because the likelihood of a Democratic House flip is gigantic and growing with every passing tweet. The Republican ranking member will probably be Patrick McHenry (R-NC). Boehner had two things to say about the whacked out North Carolina closet case in the infamous interviews over the summer-- one was that he laughed about telling the porcine little McHenry to stop sneaking into the cloak room to gobble down ice cream bars or he'd become a "fat ass." The other was that McHenry, who he likes, would one day become Speaker of the House. McHenry has taken a hefty $4,634,742 since being elected in 2004, but as he's risen in influence on the committee, Wall Street has been stepping up to the plate for him more and more aggressively. When you look at who the banksters bribed most last cycle, among current House members, only Paul Ryan ($4,434,364), Kevin McCarthy ($2,150,229), and Ed Royce ($1,408,949) took in more in bribes than McHenry's $1,381,400. And so far this cycle McHenry is number two on the Wall Street gravy train, after Ryan and McCarthy. The only possible challengers to head the Republicans on the committee would be Blaine Luetkemeyer (R-MO), Frank Lucas (R-OK) and Ed Royce (R-CA), but the GOP will let the banksters and lobbyists make the decision and they'll go with the most corrupt, as they always do, and-- hands down-- that means McHenry. (Closet queens are always the easiest to control too; a sweet bonus for the lobbyists.)

The Trump-Ryan GOP Repays The Predatory Banksters-- The Dismantling Of Consumer Protections

I wouldn't call Comey's testimony yesterday "a distraction," but it sure did distract a lot of people from watching the Dodd-Frank repeal debate in the House that was going on roughly at the same time. The Republicans passed it 233-186. Every Republican voted for it except Walter Jones (R-NC) and all the Democrats who voted, voted NO. (It's worth noting that notorious Wall Street shill, Carolyn Maloney was voting earlier in the day but managed to absent herself when this vote went down.) This is a big one for Wall Street whores like Paul Ryan and Jeb Hensarling. Before we go any further, these are the 10 worst whores currently servicing Wall Street from inside the House of Representatives. The bribe amounts account for all reported contributions since 1990:

• Paul Ryan (R-WI)- $9,781,835
• Jeb Hensarling (R-TX)- $7,468,190
• Ed Royce (R-CA)- $7,116,597
• Pat Tiberi (R-OH)- $6,521,045
• Joe Crowley (New Dem-NY)- $6,238,679
• Kevin McCarthy (R-CA)- $6,083,117
• Steny Hoyer (D-MD)- $5,983,548
• Carolyn Maloney (D-NY)- $5,595,452
• Jim Himes (New Dem-CT)- $5,590,002
• Pete Sessions (R-TX)- $5,481,670

So yesterday while Comey was digging Trump's grave, Alan Rappeport was reporting in the NY Times that Ryan and Hensarling were passing legislation to gut multiple Dodd-Frank consumer protections. Written by bank lobbyists under Hensarling's name-- and deceptively titled the Financial CHOICE Act-- it rolls back fundamental consumer and market protections painstakingly established by Dodd-Frank, including eliminating the Volcker Rule that stops banks from gambling with taxpayer money; repealing the Financial Stability Oversight Council’s (FSOC) ability to detect signs of another potential financial crisis; and destroying the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) authority to hold credit card companies, banks, payday lenders, debt collectors, and other predatory financial industries accountable. Not surprisingly, Ryan and Hensarling took the opportunity to use the legislation to roll back important protections that pre-date the 2008 financial crisis-- a gigantic gift to Wall Street banksters and predatory lenders from the slimy politicians whose careers they have financed. It targets consumers, investors and real economy businesses and increases the likelihood of both another devastating financial crisis and another big bank bailout. Karl Frisch, spokesman for Allied Progress laid out a case that I see as why voters in their districts should end the careers of Ryan, Hensarling and everyone-- regardless of party-- who voted for this monstrosity:

This legislation destroys the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau as an effective consumer regulator, making it impossible for it to act forcefully against unlawful practices in consumer markets. As a result, it would make it easier for predatory lenders, big banks, and other financial companies to rip people off.

• CFPB has obtained $11.8 billion in relief from financial companies that broke the law for 29 million consumers. It is putting in place rules to stop tricks and traps that cost billions of dollars a year.
• The legislation takes away key tools the CFPB needs to fulfill its mission, including its authority to supervise and bring enforcement actions against big banks; to prevent unfair, deceptive, and abusive practices; to regulate and enforce against lawbreaking by payday and car title lenders that charge sky-high interest rates; to maintain a public database of consumer complaints about financial firms; and much more.
• The bill would destroy the independence that has made it possible for the CFPB to serve the public interest. It would take away the Bureau’s dedicated funding, allowing industry lobbyists to push Congress to defund any actions they don’t like. It would also permit the President to fire the Director at any time without cause, instead of the Director serving for a fixed term like other bank regulators.

Wall Street’s CHOICE Act would tie the hands of bank regulators and make it easier for banks to again take risks that endanger our economy.

• The bill would repeal the Volcker Rule, which prohibits banks from acting like hedge funds by gambling with customer money.
• The legislation sharply limits the ability of regulators to ensure that banks are managed in a safe and sound manner, and have adequate funds available to absorb potential losses without turning to the taxpayer for a bailout.

          The bill exacerbates the “Too Big To Fail” problem by stripping agencies of the power to wind down megabanks without bailouts.

• It would eliminate the new authorities put in place to liquidate a bank without bailing it out or letting its failure crash the economy.
• The bankruptcy process proposed as a replacement for government liquidation authority is fundamentally unworkable, and could also immunize senior executives from responsibility for a failure, instead of holding them accountable.
• The legislation would gravely weaken the mechanisms for regulators to address emerging threats, eliminating their power to designate large non-bank financial institutions for greater supervision. A large non-bank, AIG, received the largest bailout in U.S. history.

The bill gives Wall Street a slew of new tools to overturn rules and make it harder for regulators to enforce the rules that remain.

• It requires every major rule to be approved by Congress. Political gridlock would stop regulators from ever keeping up with Wall Street shenanigans.
• It imposes dozens of additional requirements on agencies before they can take any new action, and vastly increases Wall Street’s power to stop any regulatory action in court.

The Wall Street’s CHOICE Act reduces protections for ordinary investors and the public in capital markets, and makes it easier for insiders to manipulate the system.

• The bill contains numerous provisions that weaken or eliminate laws designed to prevent fraud and abuse in capital markets. For example, it would prevent regulators from banning bad actors from financial markets and make it much more difficult to use regulatory enforcement powers when companies broke the rules.
• The bill would eliminate Dodd-Frank reforms permitting greater regulatory oversight of large private equity and hedge funds, which has thus far uncovered rampant abuse.

The bill would repeal a rule that requires retirement investment advisers to act in the best interest of their clients.

• It repeals the fiduciary rule, which could prevent Wall Street from siphoning more than $17 billion a year out of the savings of American workers and retirees.

This legislation would free up banks to charge more to use a debit card, costing more than $6 billion per year.

• The bill would repeal the Durbin Amendment, allowing big banks to rake in higher fees while doing nothing for community banks that are not covered by the provision.

South Florida progressive Democrat Tim Canova is primarying Wall Street ally and New Dem Debbie Wasserman Schultz (AKA, "Debt-Trap Debbie, darling of the payday lenders). He was predictably appalled at what Ryan and Hensarling were up to yesterday. "As an activist law professor, I have spent my entire career opposing the deregulation of Wall Street banks and their lending standards, and the gutting of the 1933 Glass-Steagall Act firewalls that have separated commercial banking from investment banking and risky securities markets for decades. And I have long supported breaking up these huge financial institutions that have become Too Big to Fail, Too Big to Manage, Too Big to Regulate, and Too Big to Jail... For far too long, families and communities still carry the devastating scars of the 2008 financial crisis-- when millions of people lost their homes to foreclosures, lost their jobs, and lost their life savings, while Wall Street banks have enjoyed trillions of dollars in government support, with no strings attached. Now is not the time to repeal major protections of the Dodd-Frank Act by letting Wall Street run wild again!"

Ryan and Mimi

In his Times article yesterday, Rappeport referred to this as the Republicans' "mission." And as far as Trump's promise to implement a "21st Century version of Glass-Steagall," that's just another in his long list of campaign lies for the rubes who voted for him. Hensarling laughed at the idea-- which was also in the GOP platform last year-- yesterday. He said Trump and Mnuchin don't even know what they mean by that and indicated he isn't taking them seriously about it. Katie Porter, a consumer advocate, UC Irvine professor and progressive Democrat running for an Orange County congressional seat currently held by Trump-Ryan rubber stamp Mimi Walters, co-authored a book with Elizabeth Warren in this area reacted immediately after the outrageous vote yesterday.

"I've seen this from my own work fighting the banks on behalf of families," she told us yesterday after the vote, "Wall Street has far too much power in Washington. And there are too many politicians like Congresswoman Walters who take Wall Streets' money and vote whichever way the banks want-- all at our families' expense. And the bill she voted for today is the biggest legislative giveaway to Wall Street since the bailouts. Walters' bill she puts our entire economy at risk once more by allowing banks to take on excessive risk, the same type of deregulation that led to the 2008 collapse. It unleashes predatory lenders that prey upon servicemembers, seniors and consumers. And Walters' bill erases key protections for consumers and guts the independent government watchdog tasked with policing Wall Street. Wall Street wrecked our economy once already. Now, Congresswoman Walters is making it easier for the big banks to destroy families' livelihoods once again."

In a note to Orange County voters, Porter wrote that "Walters voted for the Financial CHOICE Act, a bill that will effectively dismantle the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and deregulate Wall Street. I’m not just disappointed, I’m angry... I saw firsthand what happens when our leaders in Washington fail to protect consumers. The big banks put in place their cronies who looked the other way, as Wall Street banks broke the law and preyed on families-- all to boost their billion-dollar bottom lines."

Wall Street Pays Many Millions In Bribes To Get What It Wants From The House Financial Services Committee

While everyone was preoccupied with the Republican circus around TrumpCare yesterday, Congress' most corrupt committee, House Financial Services, took another step toward gutting the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. In fact, what they did yesterday would even gut some protections that were in placer before the Great Recession. The votes were basically along party lines to send Hensarling's Wall Street lobbyist-written legislation to the full House. Georgia Blue Dog and notorious Wall Street whore David Scott voted with the Republicans on one provision. (He works hard for the money.)

Allied Progress has been covering the Republican jihad against Dodd-Frank and after the committee vote yesterday they went after the members for taking what amounts to massive bribes from the industry they're supposed to be regulating and overseeing. Hensarling's bill, they correctly assert "guts protections established by the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, passed in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis caused by Wall Street fraud and recklessness. Hensarling suggested his Wall Street giveaway soon will be scheduled for a full vote by the House. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, Republican members of the committee have received at least $32,211,535 from the financial industry.

“The ‘Financial CHOICE Act’ is a deceptively named Wall Street giveaway that rewards the bankers and hedge fund managers who have showered Rep. Hensarling and other members of the House Financial Services Committee with tens of millions of dollars in campaign cash. Wall Street is getting what they paid for and it is hard-working Americans who will be left holding the bag,” said Karl Frisch, executive director of Allied Progress.

He continued, “Rep. Hensarling’s ‘Financial CHOICE Act’ is so extreme it even erases protections that predate the financial crisis, allowing Wall Street and predatory lenders to once again prey on consumers without repercussion. This legislation almost entirely eliminates the powers of the Consumer Bureau to act forcefully against unfair, abusive, and predatory practices in consumer lending. It is clear the ‘Financial CHOICE Act’ is the wrong choice for working families.”

Hensarling’s deceptively titled “Financial CHOICE Act” rolls back fundamental consumer and market protections established by Dodd-Frank, including eliminating the Volcker Rule that stops banks from gambling with taxpayer money; repealing the Financial Stability Oversight Council’s (FSOC) ability to detect signs of another potential financial crisis; and gutting the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) authority to hold credit card companies, banks, payday lenders, debt collectors, and other predatory financial industries accountable. The legislation even goes so far as to roll back important protections that predate the financial crisis.

The introduction of the “Financial CHOICE Act” comes as part of a larger campaign by Wall Street-aligned special interests, industry-backed members of Congress, and the billionaire-centric Trump administration to roll back laws and regulations that safeguard hard-working American families from Wall Street greed and deception.

These are the half dozen most egregiously bankster-bribed Republican members of the House Financial Services Committee:

• Jeb Hensarling (R-TX)- $7,372,690
• Ed Royce (R-TX)- $6,931,797
• Steve Stivers (R-OH)- $4,192,037
• Patrick McHenry (R-NC)- $3,949,286
• Peter King (R-NY)- $2,761,274
• Blaine Luetkemeyer (R-MO)- $2,371,565

Do you think that members of Congress-- obviously regardless of party-- who take money from special interests while serving on committees that are supposed to be regulating that industry/interest should be seen as guilty of taking bribery? Do you think long (like in over 10 years) mandatory prison sentences would be appropriate?

How Many Corrupt Democrats Will Back Jeb Hensarling's And The GOP's Plans To Legitimize Crooked Payday Lenders?

Congress has written the bribery laws in such a way as to exclude their own habitual behavior of taking corporate bribes. There are many examples but one that always stands out is how members of congress relate to the predatory payday lenders whose business model is ripping off the public Congress is supposed to be protecting. Instead, the biggest recipients of payday lender bribes-- especially Jeb Hensarling (R-TX), Pete Sessions (R-TX), Alcee Hastings (D-FL), Steve Stivers (R-OH), Grefgory Meeks (New Dem-NY), Patrick McHenry (R-NC), Blaine Luetkemeyer (R-MO) and Debbie #DebtTrapDebbie Wasserman Schultz (New Dem-FL)-- have worked tirelessly to enable the payday lenders who were ripping off their own constituents. The payday lenders have handed out $10,081,111 in bribes to members of Congress since 1990, most of it ($7,341,549) to corrupt Republicans. But corrupt Democrats, primarily from the Republican wing of the Democratic Party have taken $4,630,982 and helped make this criminal enterprise look like it was bipartisan support, further muddying the Democratic brand and making Democrats look more like crooked Republicans. Here's a list of the 13 most corrupt current members of the House taking the biggest tit-for-tat bribes from the payday lender industry:

• Kevin Yoder (R-KS)- $278,709
• Jeb Hensarling (R-TX)- $228,400
• Pete Sessions (R-TX)- $218,499
• Lynn Jenkins (R-KS)- $165,300
• Carolyn Maloney (D-NY)- $157,050
• Alcee Hastings (D-FL)- $148,450
• Steve Stivers (R-OH)- $139,075
• Gregory Meeks (New Dem-NY)- $138,000
• Patrick McHenry (R-NC)- $132,599
• Patrick Tiberi (R-OH)- $104,250
• Blaine Luetkemeyer (R-MO)- $99,500
• David Scott (Blue Dog-GA)- $87,130
• Debbie Wasserman Schultz (New Dem-FL)- $83,100

The most dangerous of the payday lender whores in Congress right now is Jeb Hensarling, the banksters' designated hitter to destroy Dodd-Frank and especially the CFPB. Overall, Hensarling has gobbled up $7,372,690 from the Finance Sector. The only current member of the House who has taken more bribes from the sector is Paul Ryan, clocking in at $9,354,992. Last year alone, Hensarling took $1,283,695 from the banksters. Why do they like him so much? Easy: he's not just a true believer in corruption, he's the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee. Hensarling represents a gerrymandered R+17 district that shoots south and east from East Dallas (White Rock Lake Park and Mesquite) all the way down through Athens, Jacksonville and Palestine to Wells. Trump won this backward poorly-educated district 62.7% to 34.3% and the people there are delighted to have someone like Hensarling represent them.

Last week CNN reported that his bill to repeal Dodd-Frank and replace it with something the bank lobbyists wrote, the Financial Choice Act, is moving along rapidly in Congress.

One political hurdle facing Republicans are efforts to overhaul the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which is unlikely to win Democratic support. Another contentious issue up for debate is whether to keep a cap on credit card fees.

It's likely that Senate Democrats will block at least some of the worst aspects of Hensarling's bill, which is being championed by Trump's Goldman Sachs Swamp Contingent. AP reported that Hensarling and the other bribe-taking crooks on the House Financial Services Committee-- Congress' most corrupt entity-- are "emboldened by a business-friendly president... [and] are moving to unwind the stricter regulations that took effect after the 2008 financial crisis and Great Recession," defanging the tighter rules.

The 2010 Dodd-Frank law was enacted by Democrats and President Barack Obama to respond to the crisis, putting the stiffest restrictions on banks and Wall Street since the 1930s Depression. It clamped down on banking practices and expanded consumer protections to restrain reckless conduct by financial firms and prevent a repeat of the 2008 meltdown.

The sweeping legislation rolled out by Rep. Jeb Hensarling, the Texas Republican who is Dodd-Frank's fiercest foe and heads the House Financial Services Committee, would deliver a body blow to the financial law.

"Supporters of Dodd-Frank promised it would lift the economy, end bailouts and protect consumers," Hensarling said in a statement. "Yet Americans have suffered through the worst recovery in 70 years, Dodd-Frank guarantees future bailouts for Wall Street, and consumers are paying more and have fewer choices."

Only a few weeks in office, President Donald Trump launched his attack on the financial law, ordering up a government review of the complex legislation that has been filled out with hundreds of rules written by regulators in a six-year slog. Trump says the restrictions on banks have crimped lending, the economy and job creation.

"We're going to be doing a big number on Dodd-Frank," he promised in late January.

While the review due in June could provide a blueprint, it will take legislation to make a wholesale revamp of the law.

Wielding a heavy knife, Hensarling's bill calls for repealing about 40 provisions of Dodd-Frank. It goes to the heart of the law's restrictions on banks. First, there's a new trade-off: Banks could qualify for most of the regulatory relief in the bill so long as they meet a strict basic requirement for the capital they build to cover unexpected big losses.

Federal regulators would lose the power to dismantle a failing financial firm and sell off the pieces if they decide its collapse could endanger the system. To be repealed: the Volcker Rule, which bars the biggest banks from trading for their own profit. The idea behind it was to prevent high-risk trading bets that could implode at taxpayer expense.

The legislation paints a bull's eye on the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. The five-year-old agency is a prime target for Republicans, who have long accused it of regulatory overreach. While it enforces consumer-protection laws, the CFPB also gained powers under Dodd-Frank to scrutinize the practices of virtually any business selling financial products and services: credit card companies, payday lenders, mortgage servicers, debt collectors, for-profit colleges, auto lenders, money-transfer agents.

Hensarling's bill would eliminate those powers. And it would allow the U.S. president to remove the CFPB director at will, without needing a specific cause for firing. That's the subject of a battle currently in federal court. Meanwhile, Hensarling and other Republicans have called on Trump to immediately fire CFPB Director Richard Cordray, an Obama appointee, in what has become a nasty partisan brawl.

The CFPB would be renamed the Consumer Law Enforcement Agency. No longer would its funding come from the Federal Reserve; the CFPB would have to depend on Congress to dole out the money as most federal agencies do. It would lose its authority to write rules or take enforcement action on payday loans.

The targeting of the CFPB especially rankles Democrats and consumer advocates. The agency carried out an ambitious program of investigations across the spectrum of financial products, wrote new rules for mortgage lending and opened a vast new database for consumers to lodge specific complaints against financial companies. As a result of its enforcement actions, the CFPB says it has recovered $11.7 billion that it returned to more than 27 million consumers harmed by illegal practices.

"This reckless piece of legislation makes the wrong choice for consumers and the economy, while Wall Street and predatory lenders cheer," said Ed Mierzwinski, consumer program director at U.S. Public Interest Research Group.

Among other changes to Dodd-Frank that the bill, called the Financial Choice Act, would make:

• Repeal the Federal Reserve's authority to set a cap on how much banks can charge businesses for handling debit card transactions, known as "swipe fees." The Fed set the cap at an average of about 24 cents per debit-card transaction. Prior to the cap, fees averaged 44 cents per swipe.
• The Fed also would lose its power to supervise and set rules for non-bank financial firms.
• The Financial Stability Oversight Council, a group of top federal regulators, would be stripped of its authority to label certain non-bank financial firms as potential threats to the system because their collapse could threaten the economy.

The House is hopeless but it will be instructive to see how far bankster-friendly Democratic senators-- the worst being Schumer himself, but also crooks like Kirsten Gillibrand (NY), Mark Warner (VA), Robert Menendez (NJ) and Michael Bennet (CO)-- allow Hensarling's bill to go when it gets to the Senate.

No, Unfortunately, The Republican Agenda Is Not A Mirage

Wednesday House Republicans rolled back another Obama rule so that-- after Trump signs it-- when people file for unemployment compensation they will be able to be drug-tested. Looks like the GOP is eager to ramp up the War of Drugs again-- and fill those private prison jail cells for their campaign donors. Kevin Brady's blil passed 236-189. Four of the very worst right-wing Democrats crossed the aisel to vote with the Republicans:

• Jim Cooper (Blue Dog-TN)
• Dan Lipinski (Blue Dog-IL)
• Collin Peterson (Blue Dog-MN)
• Kurt Schrader (Blue Dog-OR)

And-- lo and behold!-- this horrible legislation is rendered "bipartisan."

Yesterday, John Harwood reported for CNBC that when ole Rahm met with Trump, he came away chattering that Dreamers will be safe-- one was arrested in Seattle this week-- and that the GOP plans to repeal the Affordable Care Act will fail but that the Republicans will achieve Wall Street;'s top priority of neutering Dodd-Frank, setting the predatory banksters loose to plunder America again.

When Jennifer Steinhauer reported in yesterday's NY Times that the GOP's grand vision for Congress is falling apart and now looks like a mirage, she wasn't taking into account that the one tie that binds all Republicans for all wings the party is the greed and selfishness factor and that the pro-Wall Street/anti-Dodd-Frank mania is far from a mirage. If they accomplish not else but that, they're go to their political demises happy as pigs in shit. Sure, Trump and amateur, a buffoon and a bungling moron, but Republicanism inches forward.

Congressional Republicans, who craved unified control of the government to secure their aggressive conservative agenda, have instead found themselves on a legislative elliptical trainer, gliding toward nowhere.

After moving to start rolling back the Affordable Care Act just days after President Trump was sworn in last month, Republican lawmakers and Mr. Trump have yet to deliver on any of the sweeping legislation they promised. Efforts to come up with a replacement for the health care law have been stymied by disagreements among Republicans about how to proceed. The same is true for a proposed overhaul of the tax code.

The large infrastructure bill that both Democrats and Mr. Trump were eager to pursue has barely been mentioned, other than a very general hearing to discuss well-documented needs for infrastructure improvements. Even a simple emergency spending bill that the Trump administration promised weeks ago-- which was expected to include a proposal for his wall on the Mexican border-- has not materialized, leaving appropriators idle and checking Twitter.

At this point in Barack Obama’s presidency, when Democrats controlled Washington, Congress had passed a stimulus bill totaling nearly $1 trillion to address the financial crisis, approved a measure preventing pay discrimination, expanded a children’s health insurance program, and begun laying the groundwork for major health care and financial regulation bills. President George W. Bush came into office with a congressional blueprint for his signature education act, No Child Left Behind.

But in the 115th Congress, the Senate has done little more than struggle to confirm Mr. Trump’s nominees, and Republicans ultimately helped force his choice for labor secretary, Andrew F. Puzder, to withdraw from consideration on Wednesday in the face of unified Democratic opposition.

The House has spent most of its time picking off a series of deregulation measures, like overturning a rule intended to protect surface water from mining operations. For his part, Mr. Trump has relied mostly on executive orders to advance policies.

The inactivity stems from a lack of clear policy guidance-- and, just as often, contradictory messages-- from the Trump administration, which does not appear to have spent the campaign and transition periods forming a legislative wish list. Democrats have also led efforts to slow the confirmation of nominees to Mr. Trump’s cabinet who might otherwise be leading the charge.

“When you spend a lot of time talking about policy and debating policy in the presidential campaign, it is far easier to be specific about legislation when you get into office,” said Austan Goolsbee, who served as the chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers during the Obama administration. “President Trump spent the campaign fleshing out nothing in detail, so it’s not really a surprise that they can’t even agree on priorities, much less on actual legislative detail.”

Chief New Dem, Jim Himes, who was looking forward to teaming up with the Republicans to push the goals that bind the GOP and the Republican wing of the Democratic Party, is disappointed. "It’s painful for someone like me who was excited about infrastructure and tax reform. It seems like the administration and the majority are nowhere." But don't cry for Himes, an ex-Wall Street bankster and one of Wall Street's favorite members of Congress-- he's taken $5,547,712 in legalistic bribes from the Finance Sector since first getting into Congress in 2008-- his top priority is still very much on track: screwing with Dodd-Frank. Just ask House Financial Services Committee chairman, Jeb Hensarling! As we mentioned over the weekend, Trump's cascading unpopularity isn't slowing down the Republican (and New Dem) mania to kill Wall Street reforms-- and the #1 priority is the CFPB.

House Republicans are making a big move against the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau which was designed for basically one reason: to prevent crooked, avaricious, greed-obsessed banksters from preying on bank customers and investors. The Members of Congress the banksters pay off most richly are determined to deliver for their bankster masters by destroying the extremely successful agency.

...The chairman of the House Financial Services Committee will move forward on legislation to neuter the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and its power to crack down on predatory business practices, according to a leaked memo that emerged on Thursday and infuriated Democratic defenders of the bureau.

The memo, drafted by the chairman, Representative Jeb Hensarling, a Republican from Texas and a longtime foe of the consumer agency, aligns House Republicans with President Trump in the latest attack on President Barack Obama’s legacy. The memo detailed plans to weaken the leadership of the agency, allowing the president to replace the bureau’s director at any time. Legislation in the works would limit the bureau’s enforcement authority, reduce its ability to make rules and repeal its consumer complaint system.

It would also greatly shrink the enforcement tools at the consumer watchdog’s disposal, blocking it from being able to go after businesses engaged in deceptive practices and restricting its oversight of big publicly traded companies that are already regulated by agencies such as the Securities and Exchange Commission.

“This would substantially change the structure of the C.F.P.B. and greatly limits the scope of its authority,” said Hunter Wiggins, former principal deputy enforcement director at the bureau.

The proposal was part of a broader set of policies that Republicans have been devising to roll back the Wall Street regulations known as the Dodd-Frank Act, which emerged from the 2008 financial crisis. While Mr. Trump also supports dismantling the law, Republicans would probably be unable to accomplish a sweeping repeal of Dodd-Frank without the support of some Democrats.

That's where Himes and his New Dems come in. They just have to be a tiny bit patient.

Corrupt Congressional Conservatives Are Making Their Move To Unleash Wall Street Predators On Society Again

Are you stunned to see Trump's sinking poll numbers? You should be. A newly elected president has never had a reaction from the country like his. His first week in office and 35% of Americans already thought he should be impeached. That rose to 40% last week and then 46% this week! Rachel Maddow suggested on her show that the way she reads the data, Trump's impeachment number would be even higher except for the fact that so many people worry that Mike Pence would be even worse president than Trump!

PPP's new national poll finds that Donald Trump's popularity as President has declined precipitously just over the last two weeks. On our first poll of his Presidency voters were evenly divided on Trump, with 44% approving of him and 44% also disapproving. Now his approval rating is 43%, while his disapproval has gone all the way up to 53%. If voters could choose they'd rather have both Barack Obama (52/44) or Hillary Clinton (49/45) instead of Trump.

...Voters are increasingly taking the media's side in his fights with them. The New York Times has repeatedly been a target of Trump's attacks, but voters say they think the Times had more credibility than them 52/37. Trump seems to be losing ground in that conflict-- he was only down 51/42 a week ago. The Presidency has been so diminished over the last 3 weeks that voters even say Saturday Night Live has more credibility than Trump, 48/43.

...[U]nhappiness with Trump-- and with Congressional Republicans-- could help Democrats to make big gains in 2018. Democrats lead 49/41 on the generic Congressional ballot. That's partially a product of Trump's unpopularity but also an outgrowth of Paul Ryan (35/47 approval), Mitch McConnell (23/52 approval), and Congress as a whole (16/68 approval) being unpopular in their own rights.

Is any of that slowing down the Republicans and their catastrophic agenda? Certainly not in terms of licking the boots of the special interests that finance their careers. As Alan Rappeport reported in yesterday's more-credible-than-Trump NY Times the House Republicans are making a big move against the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau which was designed for basically one reason: to prevent crooked, avaricious, greed-obsessed banksters from preying on bank customers and investors. The Members of Congress the banksters pay off most richly are determined to deliver for their bankster masters by destroying the extremely successful agency. First the congressional crooks who have taken the biggest bribes in the past cycle from the Finance Sector:

These were just the bankster bribes for 2015-16

What you're looking at is a chart of a baker's dozen of corrupt members of Congress-- 10 Republicans and 3 slimy assholes from the Republican wing of the Democratic Party-- who have sold out their constituents for the Wall Street cash. If these 12 men and one woman were all in prison, America would be a far, far better place for working families. Note, particularly, Texas Congressman Jeb Hensarling, the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee. Since first being elected to Congress in 2002, has has taken $7,375,190 in bribes from the banksters.

The chairman of the House Financial Services Committee will move forward on legislation to neuter the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and its power to crack down on predatory business practices, according to a leaked memo that emerged on Thursday and infuriated Democratic defenders of the bureau.

The memo, drafted by the chairman, Representative Jeb Hensarling, a Republican from Texas and a longtime foe of the consumer agency, aligns House Republicans with President Trump in the latest attack on President Barack Obama’s legacy. The memo detailed plans to weaken the leadership of the agency, allowing the president to replace the bureau’s director at any time. Legislation in the works would limit the bureau’s enforcement authority, reduce its ability to make rules and repeal its consumer complaint system.

It would also greatly shrink the enforcement tools at the consumer watchdog’s disposal, blocking it from being able to go after businesses engaged in deceptive practices and restricting its oversight of big publicly traded companies that are already regulated by agencies such as the Securities and Exchange Commission.

“This would substantially change the structure of the C.F.P.B. and greatly limits the scope of its authority,” said Hunter Wiggins, former principal deputy enforcement director at the bureau.

The proposal was part of a broader set of policies that Republicans have been devising to roll back the Wall Street regulations known as the Dodd-Frank Act, which emerged from the 2008 financial crisis. While Mr. Trump also supports dismantling the law, Republicans would probably be unable to accomplish a sweeping repeal of Dodd-Frank without the support of some Democrats.

That will be difficult to get.

I have to break in here and say that Rappeport couldn't be more mistaken. While actual Democrats will oppose Hensarling with all their might, all last year he was consistently enabled in his committee by 9 crooks from the Republican wing of the Democratic Party: Kyrsten Sinema (AZ), Jim Himes (CT), Patrick Murphy (who was defeated in November but who took $2,161,722 from the banksters in 2016), John Delaney (MD), David Scott (GA), Ed Perlmutter (CO), Terri Sewell (AL), William Lacy Clay (MO) and Gregory Meeks (NY). Of the 4 new Democrats on the committee this year, 3 are stinky-fingered corruptionists of the utmost magnitude, who Hensarling was delighted to welcome aboard: Josh Gottheimer (NJ), Charlie Crist (FL) and Vicente González (TX). Notice that Rappeport seamlessly switched from the House, where the action is, to the Senate, where the Democrats are actually more united in protecting the CFPB from Trump and the Republicans.

Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Banking Committee, blasted Mr. Hensarling’s plan on Thursday and accused Republicans of plotting to turn an effective consumer watchdog into a “toy poodle.”

“It took less than three weeks for House Republicans to show their hand on how they will renege on candidate Trump’s campaign promises to hold Wall Street accountable and help working Americans,” Mr. Brown said after reviewing the memo.

Mr. Trump has been relatively muted on the future of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which is the brainchild of one of his most vocal Democratic critics, Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts. But advisers to Mr. Trump have signaled that the administration is prepared to gut the agency.

Steven Mnuchin, Mr. Trump’s nominee to head the Treasury Department, said during his confirmation hearing that the consumer protection bureau, created by Dodd-Frank, should cease to be funded by the Federal Reserve and should instead be funded through Congress, a move that could curb its independence. Representative Mick Mulvaney, Republican of South Carolina, who is waiting to be confirmed as the White House’s budget director, has referred to the bureau as a “sad, sick joke.”

And Sean Spicer, White House spokesman, said Mr. Trump had not yet decided if he would try to oust the bureau’s director, Richard Cordray, before Mr. Cordray’s term ends in 2018.

“You bet I’m worried,” Ms. Warren said in an interview. “I’m worried for the millions of working families who have gotten some help over the last five years from a strong and independent consumer agency.”

She added: “I’m worried that Trump wants to take the life out from that.”

The bureau has returned billions of dollars to bilked consumers since it was created in 2011. Its regulators exposed the scandal of Wells Fargo employees creating fake accounts.

For Mr. Trump, hobbling the bureau would have the added sweetness of outraging Ms. Warren, a political nemesis whom he derided regularly on Twitter during his campaign as Pocahontas, referring to a controversy about her Native American heritage. [Rappeport desperately needs a competent editor to get him to stop embedding GOP propaganda in his writing.]

That revenge would not be that easy to exact. While Mr. Trump is fond of bellowing, “You’re fired,” sacking Mr. Cordray could be complicated.

“In my view, attempts to fire him would be not only illegal but unwise politically,” said Rohit Chopra, a fellow at the Consumer Federation of America and a former official of the bureau. “The director of the agency is not intended to be a political pawn of the president.”

Changes to the bureau generally need to come from Congress, and Republican lawmakers have been hoping to tear it down since its inception. Mr. Hensarling argued in a Wall Street Journal editorial this week that it should be abolished.

“The C.F.P.B. has eroded freedom, trampled due process and killed jobs,” Mr. Hensarling wrote. “It must go.”

Hensarling, of course, refers of the freedom of banksters to rip off society with impunity and without regard to accountability. It's part of Republican Party DNA to refer to that as "freedom" or "liberty." Republicans are apoplectic that the CFPB has provided 27 million Americans who were ripped off by the banksters with almost $12 billion in restitution. Some of that money could have made its way into the pockets of corrupt congressional scumbags, like Hensarling, Ryan, McCarthy... well, you see that list up there. Well Fargo and Mastercard were caught red-handed stealing from their clients-- and forced to repay the people they stole from. Under Hensarlings plan, not a nickel of the stolen money would have even been discovered, let alone returned.

What kind of Democrats could support something like this? Oh, that's an easy one-- Democrats who are desperate to be primaried and Democrats who don't want any grassroots support in their reelection efforts.