Finally! A Live Candidate In Ohio: Morgan Harper

On Tuesday, Rachel Cohen and Ryan Grim did a fantastic piece, How Morgan Harper's Ohio Primary Challenge Explains The House Democratic Meltdown. It's an important read and I suggest it heartily. But what I want to talk about today is that race-- between Harper and incumbent Joyce Beatty in Columbus, Ohio. Let me start by mentioning that OH-03 has a nice healthy PVI of D+19. Hillary beat Trump there 67.0% to 28.6%, which predicts that whomever wins the Democratic primary is going to be the district's Representative. And last year, Franklin County-- which is almost entirely within the district (and is the only county in the district-- went for Sherrod Brown (68.7% to 31.3%) in the U.S. Senate race and in the gubernatorial race went for Democrat Richard Cordray 63.7% to 34.1%.

Cohen and Grim make the point that "senior members of the CBC who have served in Congress for decades are suddenly facing challenges, or looking over their shoulders at one, disrupting the smooth, biennial tradition of effectively unopposed reelections" and that that is why the CBC has been attacking The Squad. Incumbents hate primaries, especially Democrats like Joyce Beatty who has always super-served financial special interests and continues doing just that from the perch Pelosi gave her on the House Financial Services Committee. The industries that gave given her the most money are all industries overseen by her committee: insurance companies, commercial banks, real estate, securities and investments, and finance/credit companies. AOC's first big statement when she got to Congress was the urge that Democrats outlaw that kind of corrupt behavior. Meanwhile, Beatty has taken $1,411,281 from the Finance sector since 2013-- and over $2 million in corporate PAC money over her four terms.

Beatty’s funding is part of a K Street strategy that exploits the large wealth gap persisting in many majority- or plurality-black districts-- a gap that makes it much harder for CBC members to raise from wealthy donors the kind of money needed to safely stay in Congress. That, in turn, makes corporate PAC money attractive to fill the gap. CBC members privately bristle when Democrats from wealthy districts announce pledges to forswear corporate PAC money, but still fill their coffers with max-out checks from local millionaires and billionaires in San Francisco or Seattle.

By the old rules of Democratic Party politics, Beatty has done everything right. She got into Ohio politics in 1999, taking over her husband’s seat in the state House, and steadily rose through the machine, becoming the first female Democratic House leader in the state’s history. During that time, the Ohio Democratic Party largely collapsed, with the state moving from purple to red, but Beatty continued to rise, becoming a top official at Ohio State University, and by the time she’d arrived in the U.S. House, her seat appeared to be hers for life.

Morgan Harper is a 36-year-old reformer and progressive with no ties to the incompetent and fully corrupt Ohio Democratic Party. She's running on Medicare for All, the Green New Deal, Jobs Guarantee, tuition-free public college, universal child care, racial justice, affordable housing and a living wage-- all things that separate old line liberals, like Pelosi, Hoyer and their clique from today's progressives. The Ohio Democratic establishment has all but destroyed the Democratic Party in the state. Many people say it is the worst state party in America with one corrupt idiot following another, each losing more and more of the state to the Republicans. But they would much rather fight progressives-- who they routinely trash-- than Republicans.

Morgan is savvy, well-educated and seems to have a large network. She did well at the CFPB and can be counted on to make up for Beatty's intense corruption in the finance area. She seems to know exactly what she is up against. Still, Beatty is well known, and the party regulars and electeds are completely united behind her. There's not a crooked Democratic pol in the state who isn't backing her, if if, during Rick Neal's campaign against Steve Stivers in the next district over, Beatty helped Stivers, making joint appearances with him, pushing "civility." Beatty has been heavily supported by the Columbus Partnership, the corporate powers that be in central Ohio, and She was the only Democrat who Victoria's Secret billionaire Les Wexner-- another character in the Jeffrey Epstein saga-- donated to since she was elected. Joyce has had fundraisers at Wexner's home. His wife Abigail also gives hugely to Beatty. Normally Abigail gives to Democrats while Les gives to Republicans. Their L Brands PAC is one of her largest donors along with Nationwide Insurance, JP Morgan Chase and other banks, American Bankers Assoc. etc.

Campaigning with a former bankster, Stivers, sure didn't hurt her in the Wexner circles! At least the LGBTQ community woke up to what Beatty is from that little escapade. The rest of the Democratic coalition doesn't seem to care one bit.

Beatty is probably best known for having been an ally of payday lenders-- which Morgan has fought so hard to to rein in. (Beatty's husband was a payday lenders lobbyist-- a step up from his father father who just flat out ran numbers.) While minority leader in the state legislature, Beatty held up a bill that would have regulated payday lenders. Her net worth an estimated $6 million. She has a pension from the state of Ohio of $253,323 a year plus her congressional salary.

OH-03 ranks among the poorest congressional districts in the country (#378 out of 435). 60,000 children living in poverty. 54% of children living at or below 185% of poverty. 32% of children at 100% of poverty. 22% overall poverty rate, 39% at 185% of poverty.

And Beatty, outside of her service to the banksters, is known primarily for symbolic measures, such as the Tubman $20 bill, or having a Rosa Parks Day in Columbus. Or instead of questioning banks on their pay structures or their presence or absence in low income neighborhoods, about their financial stability and why they still too big to fail, their cybersecurity measures or other topics-- you know, the kind of stuff Katie Porter, also on that committee, does, she served up a softball to Bank of America, whose rep came prepared to answer, on their diversity hires. All the DC financial reform activists assert that Beatty is known to be a reliable vote for the banks in committee.

There have been rumors that sh isn't that interested in running for re-election, although I don't see any real signs of that and other members I ask tell me to forget it. After Morgan announced 2 weeks ago Joyce showed up at a media event for Edith Espinal, who is seeking sanctuary in a local church, trying to avoid deportation. Friends in Columbus tell me that they had never seen her say anything on that issue until then. I suppose she is starting to feel some pressure from the left, a good thing.

It's also worth remembering that Beatty always used to call herself Dr. Joyce Beatty, until it was revealed her "doctorate" was an honorary degree.

So Morgan is up against it. Beatty has name ID, political connections, wealthy donor connections, and a fan base that seems to care more about her wardrobe ("she threw shade on Melania by wearing the same dress!! OMG!!) and her symbolic gestures than about the substance of her work. Her voting record on the floor is mostly in step with the Democratic caucus. ProgressivePunch gives her a "C" which is a real shame for someone in a district as blue as hers.

On her side, Morgan has youth, a personal story to tell, a progressive platform, a district that is getting younger, disgruntled folks on the west side who have finally noticed that Beatty ignores them, and progressives and members of the LGBTQ community unhappy with her aid and assistance to Stivers last cycle. This one is just getting started.

Will African-American Voters Help Reform The Democratic Party?

Tuesday night, progressive reformer Morgan Harper lost her congressional primary to a corrupt, middle of the road Democratic incumbent, Joyce Beatty in Columbus, Ohio. The final result was a two-to-one rout-- 43,727 (68.29%) to 20,301 (31.71%). As of the April 8th FEC reporting deadline, Beatty had spent a massive $2,149,875 to Harper's $696,001.

The third district is entirely in Franklin County and was created to concentrate Democratic voters, allowing Republicans to protect the 12th and 15th districts. OH-03, almost the whole city if Columbus, has a PVI of D+19, while OH-12 and OH-15 each has a relatively safe R+7 PVI. The Democratic primary is dominated by African-American voters and they've been electing and reelecting Beatty, despite her utter worthlessness as a Representative, since 2012. A shill for shady financial interests, Beatty has been a darling of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC).

It isn't just the CBC, of course, protecting their incumbents, regardless of how bad the incumbent is or how good the challenger is. After all, Morgan Harper, also an African American woman, has been considered one of the brightest stars running for Congress this cycle. At 36, the former Obama administration official at the CFPB, has no ties to the incompetent and fully corrupt Ohio Democratic Party. She ran a campaign based on Medicare for All, the Green New Deal, Jobs Guarantee, tuition-free public college, universal child care, racial justice, affordable housing and a living wage-- all things that separate old line liberals, like Pelosi, Hoyer and their clique from today's progressives. The Ohio Democratic establishment has all but destroyed the Democratic Party in the state. Many people say it is the worst state party in America with one corrupt idiot following another, each losing more and more of the state to the Republicans. But they would much rather fight progressives-- who they routinely trash-- than Republicans.

There wasn't a crooked Democratic pol in the state who didn't back her, even if, during Rick Neal's campaign against Republican hot-shot Steve Stivers in the next district over, Beatty helped Stivers, making joint appearances with him, pushing "civility." Beatty has been heavily supported by the Columbus Partnership, the corporate powers-that-be in central Ohio, and she was the only Democrat who Victoria's Secret billionaire Les Wexner-- another character in the Jeffrey Epstein saga-- donated to since she was elected. Wexner and his wife have hosted fundraisers for Beatty at their home and contributed large sums of money to her. Their L Brands PAC is one of Beatty's largest donors along with Nationwide Insurance, JP Morgan Chase and other banks, American Bankers Assoc. etc.

Beatty is probably best known for having been a steadfast ally of payday lenders-- which Morgan has fought so hard to to rein in. (Beatty's husband was a payday lenders lobbyist-- a step up from his father who just flat out ran numbers.) While minority leader in the state legislature, Beatty held up a bill that would have regulated payday lenders. Her net worth an estimated $6 million. The district, though, ranks among the poorest congressional districts in the country (#378 out of 435)-- 60,000 children living in poverty. She uses her perch on the House Financial Services Committee to protect predatory banksters and further kick her own working class constituents to the curb.

And there was Beatty's picture at the top of a Politico story on Tuesday, Black Caucus seeks to squash liberal insurgents. Reporters Ally Mutnick, Heather Caygle and Sarah Ferris wrote that "Senior black Democrats are mounting an aggressive defense of Rep. Joyce Beatty in Tuesday's delayed Ohio primary, hoping to quash not only her left-wing primary challenger but the liberal insurgents gunning for a number of their colleagues. Leaders of the Congressional Black Caucus have framed the fight as greater than just defeating Beatty’s opponent, Morgan Harper, a well-funded attorney backed by the progressive group Justice Democrats. They are eager to show they can smack down any primary challengers nationwide who conspire against senior members of color who have spent decades fighting to the top."

“What is that all about? Is it attacking us?” Beatty said in an interview. “Well, let me make the message strong and clear: When you attack a hard-working member of the Congressional Black Caucus, we fight back. We are the conscience of the caucus, and we represent people.”

The CBC is stepping up to protect Beatty in an unpredictable race that some Democrats privately fear could be close, with turnout expected to be far lower amid the coronavirus outbreak that has shut down much of Ohio since mid-March.

Rep. Cedric Richmond of Louisiana, a former CBC chairman, is among several top Democrats who has helped marshal support for Beatty from both Washington and Ohio in recent months, frustrated by liberal outsiders with lengthy progressive wish lists seeking to oust party elders.

"Being 'anti' is not enough. This is about results and not just rhetoric,” Richmond said. “And just because you run with a bunch of rhetoric doesn't mean you can get results. There are people here that are effective members of Congress.”

Richmond is a bullshit artist and New Dem, the conservative Democrat tasked early on with roping in anti-progressive Democratic House members for Biden. He's tight with K street and tells lobbyists who's for sale and who's not. Other conservative Democrats backing Beatty included Oralndo's Val Demings (who some are touting, besides the fact that she is a severe sufferer from brainlessness, as a VP contender for Biden), the Queens political machine boss Gregory Meeks, and Brooklyn's Hakeem Jeffries, a contender for the post-Pelosi speakership.

Beatty's primary is the first salvo in the primary battle between the CBC and liberal groups trying to oust longtime incumbents. Besides Beatty, at least four other members of the caucus in New York and Missouri will face credible primary challengers throughout the summer.

Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-N.Y.), chairman of the CBC’s political arm, is a longtime critic of the progressive groups’ approach to primaries and hopes Beatty’s victory on Tuesday will be a shot across the bow to other challengers.

“We worked hard,” Meeks said in an interview. “We’ve done it the old-fashioned way. And so, for people who seem to come out of nowhere, who have done nothing, have nothing to show for, to say, ‘We’re just going to challenge you for the sake of challenging you.’ Does that make sense?”

Meeks added that he has retooled the CBC’s political arm this year to better defend incumbents facing primary challenges. That includes hiring a dedicated political director for the PAC who will help boost digital and on-the-ground operations.

Harper, who said she launched her grassroots campaign last July with “no coordination with the Justice Democrats,” pushed back against the suggestion that her sole purpose was to attack a member of Congress. And Harper has pushed back when pundits have called her out for targeting black lawmakers, at one point, retorting on Twitter: "I am also black."

“I think we need to reframe that, in the idea that this is somehow a targeting of an individual,” Harper said in an interview last week. “Our campaign, we are presenting an alternative policy platform to the people of the 3rd District and that is not a personal exercise.”

Back in early March, Glen Ford, editor of the Black Agenda Report looked at why so many African American voters are supporting conservative Democrats over progressives this cycle. Referring to how Biden beat Bernie in conservative South Carolina, he wrote that "Although the craven Black Misleadership Class will no doubt shout hallelujahs that 'hands that picked cotton now pick presidents' and claim Black voters exercised brilliant 'strategic' judgment in making themselves indispensable to the corprate Democratic party establishment, the true motivator of Black Biden supporters is a pervasive and deeply corrosive fear. Not just dread of four more years of Trump, although that is central to Black political behavior, but abject terror at the very thought that the Democratic Party-- 'our' party, in many Black folks’ minds-- might fracture under the challenge of the Sandernistas."

Voluminous data over many years has shown that African Americans are to the left of Hispanics on issues of bread and butter and, especially, war and peace, and far to the left of white Democrats. But, unlike Hispanics, Blacks cannot be depended on to uphold their own historical political consensus in Democratic Party primary elections for fear of weakening the chances of defeating The White Man’s Party. Hyper-conscious of their minority and despised status-- and surrounded by hostile, race-obsessed white Republicans in the southern states-- older Blacks cling to Democratic Party structures as if their lives depend on it. The ascent of Donald Trump has only tightened the duopoly trap, causing Blacks to invest their votes in candidates they perceive as 'good for the party,' as if that is synonymous with Black interests.

...The rot is deep, a product of generations of capital-subordinate Black politics that followed the violent suppression of Black self-determinationist movements and the imposition of a counterinsurgency, mass incarceration regime at the end of the Sixties. Rather than resist the New Jim Crow/Same Old Rich White Man’s Rule, the Black Misleaderhip Class eagerly offered themselves as co-managers of oppression-- for a small cut of the spoils, and the privileges of racial "leadership."

It has always been clear to Black Agenda Report that the post-Sixties betrayals of the Black Misleadership Class necessitated that a future Black liberation movement must be largely an internal Black struggle to uproot the corrupted elements in our polity. False unity has become Black folks’ Achilles Heel, allowing Black charlatans free rein in our communities and reserving most elected positions for servants of Capital. The Democratic Party is a predatory edifice of Black disempowerment, from which our people must either free themselves, or become agents of their own perpetual oppression and accomplices in the degradation of humanity, worldwide.

Black youth see the truth, and will act on it, we are certain.

Whoever Wins The Primary In Columbus Next Month Goes To Congress-- Let's Make Sure It's The Progressive

(Not the progressive)

As Markos pointed out at Daily Kos yesterday, the Ohio Republican Party is looking like it's going to the bottom of the lake in November. But 'til then, they're still running the show, however badly. When Kasich's legislature ignored all logic and drew new congressional lines to protect their favorites, they also threw a bone to Democrats in Columbus, the biggest city. They created a solidly blue, potentially progressive, bastion for the next 10 years, until the party in control redraws the boundaries. Whomever wins the March 6th primary-- yes, less than a month away-- will be a Member of Congress.

Of course, in the statewide gerrymander conservatives did all they could to protect their BFF and former banking lobbyist, Rep. Steve Stivers. They also tried to keep his nemesis and progressive champion, Mary Jo Kilroy, out of Congress by recruiting a "business friendly" candidate with deep ties to the very special interests that Mary Jo fought throughout her career. Keep in mind, it's because Mary Jo has battled against these special interests, that Blue America originally endorsed her and we were eager to endorse her again this year.

Joyce Beatty, the business community’s hand-picked political shill, just “finished” her $326,000 a year job with Ohio State University (A do-nothing giveaway position that OSU won’t even bother filling after her departure) to run for election in the newly created district. So how does one receive a job that pays $326,000 at a public university, and how can you get one? Well, in 2008 former state Representative and Minority Leader Joyce Beatty used her influence to lobby for a job at Ohio State and instantly almost quadrupled her salary from $75,971 to $320,000. Since Ohio calculates pension rates based on the top three highest salary years, Beatty's pension payment quickly ballooned to a starting payout of $211,200 annually. Her 18 year pension total will balloon to a whopping $4,771,008. BOOM! She must be extremely special to merit such a high rate of compensation in a state where most people struggle to make $25,000 annually without benefits.

I wonder what she did to get that position. Well, this wonderful "business Democrat" voted in favor of the biennial budget, which included an increase in tuition rates. Hey, somebody has to pay for her salary and pension, right? Why not drop it on the backs of Ohio’s youth? The budget specifically allowed Ohio State University to raise tuition 12.9 percent. Ca-ching! According to the Cleveland Plain Dealer “… the $320,000 salary and the timing of [the] job offered to outgoing State Rep. Joyce Beatty [has] people talking. The Columbus Democrat will become OSU's senior vice president for outreach and engagement in January, just after term limits force her out of the legislature.”

Ok, ok, ok. So she jumped at the chance to cash in on a legislative career and appears to be a bit shady. Well, let’s look a little deeper here (just a little) and see what we find. In 2008, Beatty voted for a bill that reduced the annualized interest rate for payday loans from 391 percent to 28 percent. It also prohibited loan terms of less than 31 days and limited borrowers to four loans per year. It also banned online payday lending. Sounds good, right?

Well, kind of. In 2007 prior to supporting the legislation, Beatty urged the Democratic caucus not to support the payday lending bill. This move surprised political insiders including State Sen. Ray Miller and State Rep. Hagen who described Beatty as a roadblock standing in the way of financial reform. Beatty's steadfast opposition to payday lending reform began to waffle after the Cleveland Plain Dealer published an article highlighting her husband's work as a lobbyist for national payday lender CheckSmart. Beatty contends that her husband’s position did not affect her early opposition to the bill, but refused to disclose her husband’s compensation. Her political director also took a position with a payday lending lobbyist while the legislation was still pending!

Now that she is running for Congress, Beatty’s grown even more bold. Without shame, she’s taking money from T.J. Banks. Yes, that T.J. Banks. The guy convicted of ethics violations for taking $3.7 million in no-bid state contracts while providing Republican then-Gov. Voinovich’s Chief-of-staff with a six-figure knock-off on his fiancé’s home remodeling project. The project included a luxurious 1200 sq. ft. two-story addition and brand-new 1400 sq. ft. garage.

When Voinovich’s Chief-of-staff Paul Mifsud learned of the investigation into his fiancé and his not-so-little pet project, he convinced the Union County Clerk of Courts to give him the original construction addition permits. While in his possession, he altered the documents in a blatant attempt to cover up the deal between himself and Banks. Mifsud eventually resigned as Voinovich's Chief-of-Staff and both Banks and Mifsud served jail time.

So… let’s recap. The people of Central Ohio finally get a Democratic district that a true progressive like Mary Jo should represent, but the special interests who she stood up to have hand-picked a yacht-owning (yes, she has a yacht), ethically challenged woman who’s married to a payday lending lobbyist. Are you kidding me?

Ohio needs Mary Jo Kilroy. Our nation needs Mary Jo Kilroy. As a former Congresswoman she supported healthcare reform, Wall St. reform and the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell. She’s the REAL DEAL.

Voters need to ignore Beatty, because the last thing we need in Congress is another Democrat who votes Republican. Mary Jo is a true progressive champion. There are far too few of them among us, and she deserves our strong and unwavering support. Again, if you'd like to help Mary Jo's campaign, you can do it here at our Blue America page

Virtually The Entire House Financial Services Committee Should Be Indicted For Bribery

For much of the year we've been talking about the corruption that, to a great extent, defines the New Dems in Congress and pointing specifically to the bad apples among them that managed to get onto the House Financial Services Committee, one of the principal conduits of bribery cash from the Wall Street banksters to Congress. Of the seven Democratic freshmen who were "lucky" enough to be rewarded with the plumb assignment-- Bill Foster (New Dem-IL), Dan Kildee (MI), Patrick Murphy (New Dem-FL), John Delaney (New Dem-MD), Kyrsten Sinema (New Dem-AZ), Joyce Beatty (OH) and Denny Heck(New Dem-WA)-- 5 are New Dems and a 6th, Beatty, has a long reputation for sleaze and corruption. Last year we tried pointing that out to Ohio primary voters-- but after she won, Hoyer, Israel and Crowley must have been drooling at the description: Joyce Beatty, the business community’s hand-picked political shill, just "finished" her $326,000 a year job with Ohio State University (A do-nothing giveaway position that OSU won’t even bother filling after her departure) to run for election in the newly created district. So how does one receive a job that pays $326,000 at a public university, and how can you get one? Well, in 2008 former state Representative and Minority Leader Joyce Beatty used her influence to lobby for a job at Ohio State and instantly almost quadrupled her salary from $75,971 to $320,000. Since Ohio calculates pension rates based on the top three highest salary years, Beatty's pension payment quickly ballooned to a starting payout of $211,200 annually. Her 18 year pension total will balloon to a whopping $4,771,008. BOOM! She must be extremely special to merit such a high rate of compensation in a state where most people struggle to make $25,000 annually without benefits.

I wonder what she did to get that position. Well, this wonderful "business Democrat" voted in favor of the biennial budget, which included an increase in tuition rates. Hey, somebody has to pay for her salary and pension, right? Why not drop it on the backs of Ohio’s youth? The budget specifically allowed Ohio State University to raise tuition 12.9 percent. Ca-ching! According to the Cleveland Plain Dealer "… the $320,000 salary and the timing of [the] job offered to outgoing State Rep. Joyce Beatty [has] people talking. The Columbus Democrat will become OSU's senior vice president for outreach and engagement in January, just after term limits force her out of the legislature."

She may be "business friendly," but at least she didn't join the New Dems. She's more of a lone wolf crook. The New York Times story about corruption endemic to the House Financial Services Committee, doesn't even mention the words "New Dems" but that group is at the heart of their story, which starts out castigating a crooked Republican, Andy Barr of Kentucky, who had no experience with the intricacies of Wall Street when he won the committee jackpot.

Now, half a year into his first term, he has emerged as a telling example of why the panel is sometimes called “the cash committee”-- a place, critics say, where there are big incentives for freshmen to do special favors for the industry.

Mr. Barr, 40, a first-time elected official, has raised nearly as much money this year from political action committees run by major banks, credit unions and insurance companies as longtime lawmakers like Speaker John A. Boehner and other party leaders.

The flood of financial industry cash-- $150,000 in political action committee donations to Mr. Barr in just six months-- is hardly an accident.

One afternoon in April, Mr. Barr hosted credit union lobbyists and executives in his House office just before a committee hearing, promising that he would help protect a federal tax break worth $500 million a year, the executives said. Last month, he introduced legislation to eliminate a new federal rule intended to prevent banks from issuing mortgages to customers who could not afford to repay the debt-- a measure pushed by bank lobbyists who had visited his office.

“People support him because they agree with him,” Catherine Gatewood, Mr. Barr’s spokeswoman, said after he declined requests for an interview.

But Brad Miller, a North Carolina Democrat who served on the Financial Services Committee until January, when he left Congress, said the intense focus on fund-raising by freshman lawmakers like Mr. Barr is a potent sign of the harmful way that money distorts priorities in Washington, for both Republicans and Democrats.

“Freshmen are pushed and pushed and pushed to raise money-- it’s how they are judged by the leadership and the political establishment in Washington,” said Mr. Miller, who added that he felt the same pressure when he joined the Financial Services Committee in 2003 as a freshman. “It’s only natural that it has got to be on your mind that a vote one way or other is going to affect the ability to raise money.”

After the elections in November, Democratic Party leaders gave a PowerPoint presentation urging their freshman members to spend as much as four hours a day making fund-raising calls while in Washington, and an additional hour of “strategic outreach” holding breakfasts or “meet and greets” with possible financial supporters. That adds up to more time than these first-term lawmakers were advised to spend on Congressional business.

Much of this reflects the political reality that freshmen like Mr. Barr, particularly those from districts in which neither party dominates, are considered vulnerable. And that explains why a seat on the Financial Services Committee is so coveted.

Political action committees-- set up by lobbying firms, unions, corporations and other groups trying to push their agenda in Congress-- have donated more money to Financial Services Committee members in the first six months of this year than to members of any other committee. The $9.4 million total is nearly $2 million more than the total for the Armed Services Committee, the only House panel with more members.

With so many lawmakers clamoring to be on the Financial Services Committee, it has grown to 61 members from 44 since 1980, forcing the installation of four tiered rows of seats in the Rayburn House Office Building-- with the first row of lawmakers on the floor, just in front of the tables used for witnesses.

The committee’s chairman, Representative Jeb Hensarling, Republican of Texas, remains the top recipient of donations from industry PACs this year, taking in $282,000, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonprofit group that tracks the influence of money in politics. But three Republican freshmen-- Mr. Barr and Representatives Tom Cotton of Arkansas and Ann Wagner of Missouri-- have raised more money from industry PACs than many longtime committee members like Representative Spencer Bachus, an Alabama Republican who served as the panel’s chairman until the end of last year.

The imbalance is apparent on the Democratic side as well. Each of the seven freshman Democrats on the committee has raised more industry PAC money so far this year than the committee’s top Democrat, Representative Maxine Waters of California, who has had a testy relationship with the industry.

These freshman Democrats joined this year with Republicans on the committee-- over the objection of Ms. Waters and the Obama administration-- to support measures advocated by Wall Street banks that would roll back some of the strictest provisions of the landmark Dodd-Frank financial regulations, which were passed in 2010 in the aftermath of the global recession.

A spokeswoman for Representative Patrick Murphy, a Florida Democrat who has taken in more industry PAC money than any other Democratic freshman, $53,500, said his votes had been cast based on what he believed was in the best interest of his constituents, not to please potential contributors. But she agreed that the pressure to raise money was intense.

“The system is what the system is,” said Tiffany Muller, Mr. Murphy’s deputy chief of staff, adding that her boss supported changing campaign finance rules.

Mr. Barr’s industry outreach started even before he was sworn in to office-- at a “debt retirement” luncheon at Charlie Palmer Steak, two blocks from the Capitol, that he co-sponsored with a lobbyist who represents companies like Bank of America and MasterCard International. Tens of thousands of dollars came in to help Mr. Barr eliminate his campaign debt, including large checks from the American Bankers Association and PNC Bank, among others.

In one closed meeting with credit union executives in April, which took place after the PAC for the national credit union trade association donated $5,000, Mr. Barr promised to help defend the special tax-exempt status enjoyed by credit unions and fight new regulations.

Mr. Barr, in the five minutes he was allotted to speak during the April committee hearing, asked a series of friendly questions of an industry representative and made comments that echoed the points the credit union executives had raised. “The regulatory burden is very challenging for credit unions today,” Mr. Barr said, and then asked the credit union executives to describe what it was like before Dodd-Frank.

The credit union group gave Mr. Barr an additional $5,000 contribution two months after the hearing.

Mr. Barr has introduced separate legislation that would permanently exempt banks that keep mortgages in their own portfolio from a requirement in Dodd-Frank that they follow a prescribed set of steps to ensure that customers can afford the loans. Mr. Barr’s proposal, introduced with no co-sponsors, moved with extraordinary speed through the legislative process. Within two weeks, Mr. Barr boasted, it was wrapped into a larger House bill that was passed by the entire Financial Services Committee, a coup for a House freshman.

Ms. Gatewood, Mr. Barr’s spokeswoman, said his proposals were intended to make sure that Kentucky businesses and residents had sufficient access to credit, which has been harder to come by since Congress passed the new regulations.

Mr. Barr is hardly the only freshman to introduce bills that would benefit the industry. Ms. Wagner of Missouri, another Republican freshman on the committee who has pulled in a large number of industry contributions, sponsored a bill that would block or delay Labor Department rules intended to prevent life insurance agents and other brokers from selling financial products that they know may not be in the client’s best interest.

Consumer groups like AARP have joined with groups representing investment advisers-- who are already required to meet this so-called fiduciary standard-- to protest the legislation, saying the bill Ms. Wagner introduced is an unnecessary gift to the industry. “If you want to carry industry water, carry industry’s water,” said Barbara Roper, director of investor protection for the Consumer Federation of America. “But don’t pretend you are doing it to protect investors.”

A spokesman for Ms. Wagner said her legislation would ensure that consumers had access to a range of financial services.

One industry lobbyist, who asked not to be named because client matters are supposed to be confidential, said his political action committee was sizing up all of the Financial Services Committee freshmen as it tried to determine who could best help deliver on the industry’s agenda.

“It is almost like investing in a first-round draft pick for the N.B.A. or N.F.L.,” the lobbyist said. “There is potential there. So we make an investment, and we are hopeful that investment produces a return.”

Conservative and/or corrupt House Democrats on the Agriculture Committee and the Financial Services Committee are voting with Republicans to gut Dodd-Frank. In March, writing about what a corporate shill Ann Kuster had twisted herself into, I mentioned that the derivatives vote she backed "is an especially bad idea-- one that crosses a bright red line. Former Goldman Sachs banker Jim Himes (R-CT) is working with Republicans to pass it and Kuster was one of the Democrats who went along. She's touting her connivance with corrupt New Dem Patrick Murphy, an opportunist and lifelong Republican who switched parties to run for Congress, on a phony-baloney bipartisan caucus (which includes mostly extreme right-wing Republican sociopaths like domestic terrorist Steve Stockman) and she told a New Hampshire audience recently that 'On social issues, I am what they call progressive. But on the rest of the issues, I’m business-oriented.' So a Republican on economic justice?"

And doing the same thing on House Financial Services is another phony "liberal," careerist Kyrsten Sinema (New Dem-AZ).

At a House Financial Services Committee meeting, Arizona freshman Kyrsten Sinema, who's racked up one of the most reactionary voting records of any Democrat in Congress, might have thought no one was looking when she sold out her own constituents in favor of Wall Street banksters. She backed all the GOP's deregulation proposals and then touted it in the Democratic caucus. She wasn't who I was talking about here... but she certainly could have been.

...Don't expect heroism from the Kyrsten Sinemas of the word. Careerism... sure, but not heroism or anything remotely resembling courageousness. Steve Israel dictates her votes; he told the "Frontline Democrats" how to vote and there are only 7 of them who have followed his orders "100% of the time," to quote one of them feeble enough to send me a note about it defending a crap record. These are the 7 freshmen with 40% ProgressivePunch scores (same as right-wing sociopath Paul Broun (R-Pit of Hell)-- who have voted as a block 60% of the time against progressive positions on crucial roll calls:

• Dan Maffei (New Dem-NY)
• Bill Foster (New Dem- IL)
• Cheri Bustos (IL)
• Ann Kuster (NH)
• Sean Patrick Maloney (New Dem-NY)
• Scott Peters (New Dem-CA)
• Kyrsten Sinema (New Dem-AZ)

Yes, all of these men belong in prison, not in Congress

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What Congress Really SHOULD Look And Sound Like-- Meet Morgan Harper

The Columbus, Ohio congressional district is safely blue. Trump wasn't even able to get 30% of the vote in 2016 and the PVI is D+19. It's the kind of district Democrats should be looking to for strong progressive leadership from bold thought-leaders. Instead, the incumbent there, Joyce Beatty, is a longtime crooked political hack and careerist. This cycle, Beatty is getting a powerful progressive primary challenge from former CFPB official Morgan Harper. She worked protecting consumers from the very financial institutions who had gone ago bought Beatty lock stock and barrel.

The industries that gave given Beatty, a member of the House Financial Services Committee, the most money, are all industries overseen by her committee: insurance companies, commercial banks, real estate, securities and investments, and finance/credit companies. AOC's first big statement when she got to Congress was the urge that Democrats outlaw that kind of corrupt behavior. Meanwhile, Beatty has taken $1,411,281 from the Finance sector since 2013-- and over $2 million in corporate PAC money over her four terms. Franklin County deserves better.

Morgan Harper is a 36-year-old reformer and progressive with no ties to the incompetent and fully corrupt Ohio Democratic Party. She's running on Medicare for All, the Green New Deal, Jobs Guarantee, tuition-free public college, universal child care, racial justice, affordable housing and a living wage-- all things that separate old line liberals, like Pelosi, Hoyer and their clique from today's progressives. The Ohio Democratic establishment has all but destroyed the Democratic Party in the state. Many people say it is the worst state party in America with one corrupt idiot following another as chair, each losing more and more of the state to the Republicans. But they would much rather fight progressives-- who they routinely trash-- than Republicans. Morgan is savvy, well-educated and seems to have a large and effective network, all of which she's going to need to win this battle. Below is her first DWT guest post. If you like what you see-- in her writing and in the interview-- please consider contributing to her campaign by clicking on the thermometer above.





The Economy Is Booming-- But For Whom?
by Morgan Harper

I'm running for Congress because the Third Congressional District of Ohio, like our entire country, is at a precipice. We can continue down the same road pretending we're solving the problems that plague us, or we be bold now and deliver real change.

The city in which I was born is a microcosm of why working class people don't trust the Establishment. Yes, the economy is booming in Central Ohio like no other region in the state. But booming for whom? This is the second most economically segregated place in the country. The unemployment rate is hovering around 3%, yet roughly 30% of Black and Latinx families live under the poverty line. According to Franklin County's own report, many of the concentrated areas of extreme poverty have experienced "no change" in the poverty rate in the past 40 years. 60% of our neighborhoods have only gotten poorer over the same time period. Columbus, like the country as a whole, is expanding in ways that benefit fewer and fewer at the very top, while wages remain stagnant and cost of living continues to rise for everyone else.

The city now has more renters than homeowners. Unfortunately, rents will continue to rise in the coming years as our leaders have failed to build enough new housing units to match the everyday influx of new residents, and as the federal government long ago abdicated its duty to provide housing as a human right. Between 2012 and 2017, home prices in Central Ohio have risen by an average of nearly six percent annually, while household income has increased by just over one percent annually during this same period. Gentrification, nearly stagnant wages, and an affordable housing shortage is making far too many people in Central Ohio housing-unstable.

I'm running for Congress to deliver the bold policy solutions needed to correct our country's course. Fighting against the menace in the White House is the baseline for any Democrat. If we are to return the Democratic Party to its historic roots of defending working-class Americans, we cannot continue electing millionaire politicians who are beholden to real estate developers and other corporate interests who line their political pockets.

Ohio Congressional District 3 is an oddity in state electoral politics in that it's a powerful seat that's impossible for a Republican to win. Democratic voters deserve an unbought and unbossed Member of Congress who will go all out to drive forward America's need for structural change. We deserve an advocate that can harness new media to leverage the national debate around national rent stabilization policies. We deserve a Congressional representative that will stand in solidarity with 800 public school teachers when they picket a City Council meeting; that will work for the 25% of children in Columbus living in poverty; and that will address the profoundly unjust racial history in our country that has resulted in black families having an average of $9,000 in net wealth after centuries of living here. We need a representative that will fight to ensure everyone who calls Central Ohio home can, at the very least, meet their basic needs and live a stable life.

Growing up on the east side of Columbus, I never envisioned myself one day running for Congress. But, I could no longer sit on the sidelines while millionaire politicians, only interested in ceremonial leadership, fail to deliver results for people who actually have to work for a living.

Defeating an electoral machine is never easy, and I wouldn't have it any other way. I am not a career politician bankrolled by special interest groups. My funding and power come from people who agree the status quo is untenable. Together, we can move Central Ohio away from "the way things have always been done," away from the political machine that has killed any awareness of what Congress does and any hope that real people have of the federal government delivering change for the many and not just the few.

Midterm Report: The Best and the Worst Democratic Freshmen

Time to grade the Democratic freshmen-- or at least to pick out the 10 best and the 10 worst. Which ones lived up to what Alan Grayson laid out in his little monologue above? And which served the interest of careerism and corporate special interests above the interests of their own constituents? Short version-- for people in a hurry-- here are two lists (alphabetized), the 10 best, followed b the 10 worst:

THE BEST:

• Tony Cardenas (D-CA)
• Matt Cartwright (D-PA)
• Alan Grayson (D-FL)
• Jared Huffman (D-CA)
• Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY)
• Joe Kennedy (D-MA)
• Alan Lowenthal (D-CA)
• Grace Meng (D-NY)
• Rick Nolan (D-MN)
• Mark Pocan (D-WI)

THE WORST:

• Cheri Bustos (D-IL)
• Pete Gallego (Blue Dog-TX)
• Joe Garcia (New Dem-FL)
• Ann Kirkpatrick (D-AZ)
• Dan Maffei (New Dem-NY)
• Sean Patrick Maloney (New Dem-NY)
• Patrick Murphy (New Dem-FL)
• Scott Peters (New Dem-CA)
• Raul Ruiz (D-CA)
• Kyrsten Sinema (New Dem-AZ)

The other day, Obama seemed to help justify the Egyptian military coup by declaring that democracy is about more than just elections. Eric Cantor liked that. The Washington Post didn't. You decide. Meanwhile, though, figuring out which congressmen did best and did worst is about more than just raw voting. Voting on bills that come to the floor is very, very important, of course, but there are other factors as well, like courageousness, leadership, behavior on committees, integrity. Example: freshmen who voted in the House Financial Services Committee-- so somewhat privately-- to gut Dodd-Frank Wall Street reforms and then piled onto a plane with Democratic corruptionist Joe Crowley to celebrate with Wall Street banksters, are never going to get on a 10 Best list. Freshmen with the guts and smarts to sign the Grayson-Takano No Cuts letter, however, have a leg up on any 10 Best list.

The 10 freshmen who signed that letter are a mixed bag though, including really excellent Members like Grayson himself, as well as Matt Cartwright and Rick Nolan and really awful sellouts looking for another way to bash Obama, like Ann Kirkpatrick, or for a cheap way to burnish progressive credentials for the folks back home, like Juan Vargas. These are the freshman signers (in order of date signed):

• Alan Grayson (D-FL)
• Mark Takano (D-CA)
• Rick Nolan (D-MN)
• Matt Cartwright (D-PA)
• Joyce Beatty (D-OH)
• Ann Kirkpatrick (D-AZ)
• Tony Cardenas (D-CA)
• Donald Payne (D-NJ)
• Dan Kildee (D-MI)
• Juan Vargas (D-CA)

The best freshman and the worst freshman each comes from Florida. Overall best is Alan Grayson, more than just a good voter-- a real leader and organizer. And please do watch that video up top. Ironically, the worst freshman, Patrick Murphy, is also a leader and an organizer-- he's leading other freshmen, really dumb ones, astray and organizing to help push through Boehner's toxic agenda. But let's get to the roll calls that we counted in assessing each freshman. We're listing them in chronological order, starting with a typical cheap trick by the GOP threatening that Members wouldn't get paid 'til a budget was passed. H.R. 325 passed on January 23, 285-144 with 86 Democrats joining most of the Republicans to pass it. It was the first big bill showing that most of the conservative New Dem freshmen would side with the GOP on their agenda. The freshmen who crossed the aisle: Ami Bera (CA), Julia Brownley (CA), Cheri Bustos (IL), Joaquin Castro (TX), John Delaney (MD), Suzan DelBene (WA), Tammy Duckworth (IL), Bill Enyart (IL), Elizabeth Esty (CT), Bill Foster (IL), Pete Gallego (TX), Denny Heck (WA), Steven Horsford (NV), Derek Kilmer (WA), Ann Kirkpatrick (AZ), Ann Kuster (NH), Alan Lowenthal (CA), Michelle Lujan Grisham (NM), Dan Maffei (NY), Sean Patrick Maloney (NY), Grace Meng (NY), Patrick Murphy (FL), Rick Nolan (MN), Beto O'Rourke (TX), Scott Peters (CA), Raul Ruiz (CA), Brad Schneider (IL), Kyrsten Sinema (AZ), Mark Takano (CA), Dina Titus (NV), and Filemon Vela (TX). Chief New Dem Ron Kind and DCCC chair Steve Israel also voted with the Republicans on this and strongly urged the freshmen to do likewise. It helped established a very bad pattern, a pattern that some have since seen through and have broken free of-- like Lowenthal, Nolan, and Takano-- but one that has ensnared too many freshmen in the quicksand of false bipartisanship. Every one of the 10 worst freshmen voted with the GOP on this early bill.

H.R. 444 passed on February 6 and it was another gimmicky GOP balanced budget bill. 26 Democrats joined 227 Republicans to pass it 253-167. The freshmen aisle crossers were Ami Bera (CA), Cheri Bustos (IL), Ann Kirkpatrick (AZ), Ann Kuster (NH), Dan Maffei (NY), Sean Patrick Maloney (NY), Patrick Murphy (FL), Scott Peters (CA), Raul Ruiz (CA), Kyrsten Sinema (AZ), and Dina Titus (NV). So here we were in February and the lines between the good freshmen and the bad freshmen were already starting to become very clear. Most of these would go on to back Boehner and Cantor from then right up until now.

H.R. 273 is intended to freeze the pay of federal employees. It passed 261-154, on February 15, Boehner and Cantor able to claim a bipartisan victory because of these largely worthless freshmen: Julia Brownley (CA), Cheri Bustos (IL), Suzan DelBene (WA), Bill Enyart (IL), Bill Foster (IL), Pete Gallego (TX), Joe Garcia (FL), Ann Kuster (NH), Dan Maffei (NY), Sean Patrick Maloney (NY), Patrick Murphy (FL), Scott Peters (CA), Raul Ruiz (CA), Brad Schneider (IL), Kyrsten Sinema (AZ) and Filemon Vela (TX). You should be starting to recognize the repeat offenders now.

H.R. 933 passed 267-151 on March 6 and the intention was to soften the blow of the sequester for the Pentagon while leaving all the other victims in the lurch. 53 bad Democrats went along with the GOP, including 28 freshmen, these freshmen: Ami Bera (CA), Julia Brownley (CA), Cheri Bustos (IL), Joaquin Castro (TX), Suzan DelBene (WA), Bill Enyart (IL), Elizabeth Esty (CT), Bill Foster (IL), Tulsi Gabbard (HI), Pete Gallego (TX), Joe Garcia (FL), Steven Horsford (NV), Ann Kirkpatrick (AZ), Ann Kuster (NH), Alan Lowenthal (CA), Michelle Grisham Lujan (NM), Dan Maffei (NY), Sean Patrick Maloney (NY), Patrick Murphy (FL), Gloria Negrete McLeod (CA), Beto O'Rourke (TX), Scott Peters (CA), Raul Ruiz (CA), Brad Schneider (IL), Kyrsten Sinema (AZ), Mark Takano (CA), Dina Titus and Marc Veasy (TX).

H.R. 890, meant to prevent the federal government from giving states greater flexibility when complying with a welfare program’s work requirements, passed 246-181 on March 13. Only 18 Democrats crossed the aisle on this one, including 8 freshmen: Ami Bera (CA), Joe Garcia (FL), Ann Kirkpatrick (AZ), Dan Maffei (NY), Sean Patrick Maloney (NY), Patrick Murphy (FL), Scott Peters (CA), and Kyrsten Sinema (AZ), the ones Boehner and Cantor were coming to depend on pretty consistently to make their awful bills "bipartisan."

H Con Res 25 on March 20 was the budget bill. There were a lot of alternatives, starting with a proposal to pass the budget the Senate had already passed, not a great budget, but not nearly as bad as the Ryan budget the House was about to vote on. The Senate budget was defeated in the House 154-261 with 35 Democratic defectors including the 17 worst freshmen: Ami Bera (CA), Julia Brownley (CA), Cheri Bustos (IL), John Delaney (MD), Bill Enyart (IL), Bill Foster (IL), Pete Gallego (TX), Joe Garcia (FL), Ann Kirkpatrick (AZ), Ann Kuster (NH), Dan Maffei (NY), Sean Patrick Maloney (NY), Patrick Murphy (FL), Scott Peters (CA), Raul Ruiz (CA), Brad Schneider (IL) and Kyrsten Sinema (AZ).

When Raul Grijalva introduced the Progressive Caucus budget alternative-- the only budget that would have solved the problems plaguing America-- it lost 84-327. Only 13 freshmen voted FOR it, the better freshmen: Joyce Beatty (OH), Tony Cardenas (CA), Matt Cartwright (PA), Alan Grayson (FL), Jared Huffman (CA), Hakeem Jeffries (NY), Alan Lowenthal (CA), Rick Nolan (MN), Don Payne (NJ), Mark Pocan (WI), Mark Takano (CA), Juan Vargas (CA), and Marc Veasy (TX).

The House Democratic Caucus budget wasn't as good as the one Grijalva proposed but it was still way better than Ryan's. It lost 165-253 and really did encompass a vision for what the House Democrats would like to accomplish. 28 bad Democrats voted against it including 17 freshmen: Ami Bera (CA), Julia Brownley (CA), Cheri Bustos (IL), Suzan DelBene (WA), Bill Enyart (IL), Bill Foster (IL), Pete Gallego (TX), Joe Garcia (FL), Ann Kirkpatrick (AZ), Ann Kuster (NH), Dan Maffei (NY), Sean Patrick Maloney (NY), Patrick Murphy (FL), Scott Peters (CA), Raul Ruiz (CA), Brad Schneider (IL) and Kyrsten Sinema (AZ)-- all the worst garbage in the caucus.

H.R. 624, CISPA, was a domestic spying bill that passed 288-127 on April 18. The Democratic caucus was very split-- 98 against and 92 for. The bad freshmen should be very predictable for you by now, although a few weak links among usually not-as-bad-Democrats went along with it as well: Joyce Beatty (OH), Ami Bera (CA), Julia Brownley (CA), Cheri Bustos (IL), Tony Cardenas (CA), Tammy Duckworth (IL), Bill Enyart (IL), Bill Foster (IL), Loius Frankel (FL), Pete Gallego (TX), Joe Garcia (FL), Denny Heck (WA), Steven Horsford (NV), Hazeem Jeffries (NY), Robin Kelly (IL), Derek Kilmer (WA), Ann Kirkpatrick (AZ), Ann Kuster (NH), Michelle Lujan Grisham (NM), Dan Maffei (NY), Sean Patrick Maloney (NY), Grace Meng (NY), Patrick Murphy (FL), Don Payne (NJ), Scott Peters (CA), Raul Ruiz (CA), Brad Schneider (IL), Kyrsten Sinema (AZ), Eric Swalwell (CA), Dina Titus (NV), Juan Vargas (CA), Marc Veasey (TX) and Filemon Vela (TX).

H.R. 1062 was another conservative initiative to weaken regulations on Wall Street. It passed 235-161 on May 17 with 17 Democrats voting with the Republicans, including 9 freshmen-- Ami Bera (CA), Tony Cardenas (CA), Pete Gallego (TX), Dan Maffei (NY), Sean Patrick Maloney (NY), Scott Peters (CA), Raul Ruiz (CA), Brad Schneider (IL) and Kyrsten Sinema (AZ).

H.R. 3 was a big one-- the Keystone XL Pipeline bill on May 22. It passed 241-175 with 19 Democrats going along for the ride, including 5 anti-environment freshmen: Cheri Bustos (IL), Bill Enyart (IL), Sean Patrick Maloney (NY), Patrick Murphy (FL) and Filemon Vela (TX).

H.R. 1911 was also a big one-- the GOP bill to double the rate on student loans. Only 4 Democrats were stupid enough to vote for that one and 3 are New Dem freshmen with terrible records: Joe Garcia (FL), Dan Maffei (NY) and Scott Peters (CA).

H.R. 1947 was the failed Farm Bill that shredded food stamps for the most needy Americans. Only 24 Democrats voted for it, including 8 freshmen: Ami Bera (CA), Julia Brownley (CA), Cheri Bustos (IL), Bill Enyart (IL), Joe Garcia (FL), Patrick Murphy (FL), Kyrsten Sinema (AZ), and Filemon Vela (TX). There were a ton of amendments that showed how bad some of these freshmen are including one to defund farmers markets by Tom McClintock that drew exactly one "Democratic" vote: New Dem Patrick Murphy (FL). 8 Democrats voted against Jim McGovern's amendment to reinstate the SNAP food stamp funding and 2 of them were freshmen-- Cheri Bustos (IL) and Sean Patrick Maloney (NY).

H.R. 1613 and H.R. 2231 passed June 27 and 28, the two most recent Republican travesties. Both bills, written by Oil and Gas lobbyists, were big giveaways for offshore drilling businesses. The only Democratic freshmen to go along with either or both of them were Ami Bera (CA), Cheri Bustos (IL), John Delaney (MD), Pete Gallego (TX), Joe Garcia (FL), Patrick Murphy (FL), Scott Peters (CA), Raul Ruiz (CA), Kyrsten Sinema (AZ) Marc Veasey (TX) and Filemon Vela (TX).

Don't forget, this report card is only for freshmen. We didn't count Ron Barber (New Dem-AZ) as a freshman and he's literally worse than any of the freshmen. So are 4 other more senior Democrats, the worst of their party in the House, by far. From bad to worse (with their ProgressivePunch scores):

• Collin Peterson (Blue Dog-MN)- 40.00
• Bill Owens (New Dem)-NY)- 33.33
• John Barrow (Blue Dog/New Dem-GA)- 28.33
• Jim Matheson (Blue Dog-UT)- 26.67

This year, six Republicans have voted more frequently with the Democrats on crucial roll calls than Matheson and Barrow. The DCCC will spend an estimated $4 million in a desperate and pointless attempt to reelect both of them.

Watch the Grayson video up top again-- and keep it in your mind the next time the DCCC asks you for money. Virtually all of it that doesn't wind up their cronies' pockets, goes to reelect these Democrats who vote most frequently with the GOP. In the clip, Grayson reminds Democratic candidates running for office that "If you have two Republicans running against each other, one with an 'R-e-p' next to his name and one with a 'D-e-m' next to his name, it's a tremendous disservice to the public. The public can't choose that way. And if you run as a Democrat, then there are certain things you should stand for. You should stand for Justice. You should stand for Equality. You should stand for Peace... We need more Democrats who are Democrats... You can't beat a Republican by BEING a Republican."

Do You Vote Democratic As A Default Position? BIG Mistake!

How Wall Street Screws America

What do these 13 Democrats have in common?

• Brad Sherman (CA)
• Gregory Meeks (New Dem-NY)
• David Scott (New Dem-GA)
• Ed Perlmutter (New Dem-CO)
• Jim Himes (New Dem-CT)
• John Carney (New Dem-DE)
• Terri Sewell (New Dem-AL)
• Bill Foster (New Dem-IL)
• Patrick Murphy (New Dem-FL)
• John Delaney (New Dem-MD)
• Kyrsten Sinema (New Dem-AZ)
• Joyce Beatty (OH)
• Juan Vargas (New Dem-CA)

Let's not start with "they all belong in prison for corruption" because that's the end of this post. And, not every single one of them is a New Dem; two aren't. But they all made a concerted effort to get on the House Financial Services Committee-- the well-spring of congressional corruption-- and, as members of that committee, they all voted for H.R. 5424 last week. And they all take significant bribes from the very Finance Sector that they're meant to be keeping from ripping off consumers. These 13, in fact, have been among the worst enablers of the financial sector when it comes to ripping off consumers and endangering the country's financial health. Let's reorder the list in terms of how much in bribes each one has gotten-- this cycle alone-- from the Finance Sector:

• Patrick Murphy- $1,413,950
• Jim Himes- $618,150
• Kyrsten Sinema- $589,388
• Ed Perlmutter- $455,157
• Bill Foster- $401,935
• Terri Sewell- $379,400
• David Scott- $368,640
• John Delaney- $351,750
• Gregory Meeks- $338,550
• Brad Sherman- $300,750
• Juan Vargas- $247,549
• Joyce Beatty- $225,050
• John Carney- $164,450

So what is this H.R. 5424 to which I referred? Well, let's turn to Yves Smith's Naked Capitalism to get a good read on what Wall Street lobbyists, the Republican Party and these corrupt Democrats called the "investment Advisers Modernization Act." If it passes and Obama signs it, it "would allow the hedge fund and private equity industry, which are rich enough to pay for the few parking-ticket-level fines the SEC hands out, to escape from virtually all enforcement efforts. Worse, it would considerably weaken protections meant to stop Madoff-type frauds, and leave retail investors exposed."

Dodd Frank stipulated that private equity and hedge funds beyond a modest size be regulated as investment advisers. That subjected them to SEC examinations. The initial round exposed widespread misconduct in private equity, including what would normally be called embezzlement.

Yet the agency has fined remarkably few sanctions, and the fines have been light relative to the extent of the misconduct alleged by the SEC and unearthed by the press.

To make a bad situation worse, the SEC retreated from its tough enforcement talk within months, and more recently, has been trying to fool the chump public into believing that its weak enforcement actions are having an impact when private equity form ADV filings with the SEC reveal the reverse, that many firms are continuing to engage in precisely the same conduct that the SEC has deemed to be a securities law violation.

But even this cronyistic enforcement charade is an offense to these Masters of the Universe. HR 5424 would gut Dodd Frank oversight. I’ve attached a letter from Americans for Financial Reform at the end of the post, which sets forth how this bill makes a mockery of the idea of investor protection.

...[T]he bill creates exemptions to the requirement that investment advisers have their holdings independently audited at least annually. The exemptions on the surface appear to apply to closely-held funds. It carves out ones whose investors are “officers, directors, and employees” of not just the fund manger, but also of “affiliated persons,” their “officers, directors, and employees,” current and former family members, and “officers, directors, and employees,” who provide or have entered into contracts to provide services….and not just to the investment vehicle itself, but to any of its clients!

It’s easy to see how this provision could be abused by, say, having someone enter into a sham or trivial service agreement to get access to a supposedly hot manager. You can even hear the patter: “The only people who can invest are friends and employees, and OMG have they made boatloads, but the SEC will allow you to invest if we are your client. And that’s really easy to do. Just sign this contract…”

As professor Jennifer Taub stated in her testimony on the bill last month:

Just when private equity funds are in the sunlight thanks to Dodd-Frank and many have been exposed in SEC examinations as in violation of the law, you are now proposing that they be able to hide their tracks. Instead of encouraging a culture of compliance, this bill would provide a loophole for investment adviser recordkeeping requirements. Subjecting communications to confidentiality agreements or keeping them in-house would allow advisers to destroy critical investment records…

The Investment Advisers Modernization Act of 2016 is misnamed. Instead of ushering in modernity, it would send the SEC and investors back to the Dark Ages. Like the other bills today, it is misaligned with the hearing’s title, “Legislative Proposals to Enhance Capital Formation, Transparency, and Regulatory Accountability.” This bill would not enhance capital formation. Instead it would undermine investor protection and trust, which could inhibit or drive up the cost of capital. It would not promote transparency, but allow certain private equity advisers and other private fund advisers that have been exposed as lacking in recent SEC examinations to hide their tracks. It would not encourage regulatory accountability. Instead it would punish regulatory success, depriving the SEC of the information and tools it has been using to monitor system-wide risks, identify firm-specific risk, investigate fraud, and enforce the law.

It was funny yesterday when Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH) sent out an e-mail moaning about how the Republicans are trying to destroy Dodd-Frank. "Dodd-Frank," he wrote, "is the package of safeguards Democrats passed after Wall Street devastated our economy in 2008. It’s designed to protect consumers and homeowners, and make sure the risky behavior that triggered the Great Recession doesn’t happen again. Make no mistake about it: Republicans in Congress are trying to take a jackhammer to those safeguards. They don’t have a problem putting Main Street back on the hook for Wall Street’s greed."

Is it too difficult for Brown to acknowledge that it isn't only Republicans but the Republican-wing of his own party-- the New Dems and Blue Dogs primarily-- who are working steadily to erode and, in his words, "destroy" Dodd-Frank. That is certainly why Wall Street has given more money to Patrick Murphy than any other non-incumbent running for the Senate this year-- more, by far, than any Republican. He has shown Wall Street his willingness-- actually eagerness-- to serve their interests on the House Financial Services Committee. Sherrod Brown is very aware of Patrick Murphy's record and behavior and his devotion to the Wall Street banksters. And Sherrod Brown endorsed him-- not against a Republican, but against a proven and effective fighter against Wall Street excess, Alan Grayson. He also refuse dto endorse Bernie and gave an early nod to Hillary, another conservative Democrat whose affinity towards Wall Street is hardly secret.

"Demand Congressional Republicans leave the Dodd-Frank financial reforms in place," continued Brown. "I'm more than willing to admit that there are portions of Dodd-Frank that can be improved. We still have banks in this country that are “Too Big To Fail”-- that’s something we should fix.But Republicans aren’t talking about improvements, they’re talking about going back to the same practices that caused the Great Recession." Yeah... and so are the New Dems like Brown-endorsee Patrick Murphy.

Can we, as voters, fight back against Wall Street dominance? It's not easy... but you can start here: