I don't care what the Republicans MIGHT do if they regain control of Congress. I'm not scared enough of them to associate myself with the gutless, principle free wonders like Mr. Baucus. I am only responsible for my vote. If the Democrats can't do better than this for the American people, if they insist on continuing to serve their Wall Street masters, they don't deserve to retain control.

WHen they get down to it, this is the maneuver the Democratic misleaders always pull. "You might not like what we're doing but the GOP would be worse." BLEEP that donkey dung.

A disgusted County Democratic Party chairperson

Jim Senter

You make it sound like we've dodged the bullet. Far from it. Real estate, stock market price bubbles are busy re-inflating. The fundamentals of the real economy have gotten far worse. We will see a Second Great Depression, because we have failed to act on the lessons of the Great Recession.

If you look closely at the history of the 1930s, it is plain that a progressive movement is not the inevitable result of economic meltdown. It turned out differently in Italy,in Spain and Germany. Without FDR in the WHite House, the Huey Longs and Father Coughlin's, the Silver Shirts would have won the field.

ANd in case anyone failed to notice, Mr. Obama is NO FDR, much to our detriment.

The point is, where credit card companies operate in a predatory fashion, where rotten meat is sold, commerce crashes and burns. Regulation may inhibit profit maximization, but it is absolutely critical for markets to function. Force millions of families into bankruptcy with predatory credit card policies, and they stop buying. Selling sickening meats, and people lose confidence in our food distribution system and stop buying. It's simple. We need enforced regulation in order for the economy to function.

It's a perversity of the highest order, this idea that anything that limits the action of greed is anti- business and will destroy the economy. That is NOT the way the world works.

This debate about regulatory restrictions on predatory finance reminds me of one of FDR's speeches, his second inaugural....

"We have always known that heedless self-interest was bad morals; we know now that it is bad economics. Out of the collapse of a prosperity whose builders boasted their practicality has come the conviction that in the long run economic morality pays. We are beginning to wipe out the line that divides the practical from the ideal; and in so doing we are fashioning an instrument of unimagined power for the establishment of a morally better world."

".....Our progress out of the depression is obvious. But that is not all that you and I mean by the new order of things. Our pledge was not merely to do a patchwork job with secondhand materials. By using the new materials of social justice we have undertaken to erect on the old foundations a more enduring structure for the better use of future generations.

In that purpose we have been helped by achievements of mind and spirit. Old truths have been relearned; untruths have been unlearned. We have always known that heedless self-interest was bad morals; we know now that it is bad economics. Out of the collapse of a prosperity whose builders boasted their practicality has come the conviction that in the long run economic morality pays. We are beginning to wipe out the line that divides the practical from the ideal; and in so doing we are fashioning an instrument of unimagined power for the establishment of a morally better world.

This new understanding undermines the old admiration of worldly success as such. We are beginning to abandon our tolerance of the abuse of power by those who betray for profit the elementary decencies of life.

In this process evil things formerly accepted will not be so easily condoned. Hard-headedness will not so easily excuse hardheartedness. We are moving toward an era of good feeling. But we realize that there can be no era of good feeling save among men of good will.

For these reasons I am justified in believing that the greatest change we have witnessed has been the change in the moral climate of America."

... if the something further entrenches the power of drug and insurance companies and gives them, at the least, 5 more years to continue to ream us a new one.

Just say NO to sham reform.

Not just no, but HELL NO!

.... I have some land in southern Louisiana just for you! It's even above water twice a day- for now.

But seriously, does anyone expect the Fed to utilize this authority? The Fed, whose members are appointed by the banking industry, and come from the banking industry? And go back to the industry when they leave government employ?The organization that refused to use the regulatory power it had to reign in the housing bubble, and out of control leverage in the derivatives market? This is smoke and mirrors. Change that will change nothing.

....except that, unlike the death panel allegations, THERE'S A GRAIN OF TRUTH IN THIS ONE. The GOP propose no reform of their own. They have no proposal to restrain health care costs. They propose nothing to address the condition of all the families thrown into bankruptcy by medical emergencies, even WITH health insurance. So if you get sick, you'd better die quickly, before you sign over all you have to some rich fk insurance company CEO. I'm glad to see there's ONE Democrat willing to fight fire with fire. Grayson wasn't the one who started inflaming passions in this debate. But we'd damn well better be the ones to finish it.

One of the reasons this country is in such a sorry state is that elected Democrats don't believe there's anything worth FIGHTING for, except their own re-elections.