Warren Groundswell Pressures Administration to Make Recess CFPB Appointment (Updated: Panicked Republicans Keep Senate Open for Business)

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Progressive groups launched an online petition calling for the Administration to make a recess appointment of Elizabeth Warren to head the CFPB. Not surprisingly, it gained traction quickly, and now has 158,000 signatures (the initial goal, as reported by Housing Wire, was 175,000; it was apparently increased based on the sign up rate).

This weekend is theoretically a window for a recess appointment (note that the lengthy Senate confirmation process makes it impossible for anyone to be in place by the Dodd Frank start date of July 21, so a recess appointment looks to be inevitable). But there’s no reason to use this opportunity given a Senate July 4-10 break.

I urge readers to sign the petition while maintaining my view that Warren will not get the nod. The Administration has been casting about for Anybody But Warren to take the job, with the amusing result than many of the candidates saying that Warren should get the job. Warren’s stubborn refusal to take the Republican’s aggressive moves and the Administration’s obvious antipathy seriously is creating marvelous political theater. We’ve now had the spectacle of Geithner, whose bank-coddling stance makes him an ideological opponent of the Harvard professor, being forced to support her in public in the face of ham-handed attacks by Republican Senators this week.

So far, the Administration has been able to neuter critics on the left by getting nominally liberal organizations defunded if they don’t toe the party line. They started with smaller groups early on to demonstrate the costs of defiance and I have been told of much large, more established groups coming into the Administration’s crosshairs as part of its pre-2012 brush-clearing. Warren, who has profile and standing independent of any progressive institutional infrastructure, is outside their normal mechanism of disciplining the uncooperative. And she refuses to do a Brooksley Born and quietly slink away under fire.

Now admittedly Warren has not crossed swords with the powers that be in as direct a manner as Born. She’s kept her head down and played a cautious bureaucratic game, despite her frontal manner in hearings. And if I am proven wrong and she does get the nod, it will be because she has convinced the Administration that she will behave. She may believe that half a loaf is better than none, and that CFPB measures to improve disclosures and make it easier for consumers to comparison shop and file complaints will be hard for the banks to block and will do more to protect consumers than Team Obama might think. So I’m more comfortable with Warren losing the appointment but discomfiting the Administration than with her making whatever pact with the devil she’d have to enter into to win the CFPB job.

Update 2:00 AM: Reader propertius points out that the Senate has scheduled “pro forma” sessions to keep the Senate officially in session and block a recess appointment over the one-week holiday. As we noted, we didn’t expect Obama to try to appoint Warren this weekend, and this maneuver does provide Obama with a convenient out. The question is whether anyone on the left will be imaginative enough to make the Republicans look as craven as they are in pretending to be open for business to derail a single tough-minded woman. Details from The Hill:

GOP opposition is preventing the Senate from completely adjourning for the Memorial Day recess. Instead, the chamber will come in for three pro-forma sessions over the next ten days.

The cursory sessions are a formality that will ensure President Obama does not make recess appointments, a prospect that was considered unlikely anyway because the recess is scheduled for only a week….

Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) applauded the GOP action to ensure recess appointments would not take place.

“President Obama has been packing federal agencies with left-wing ideologues, but thankfully he won’t be able to for at least the next week. The House will not be sending an adjournment resolution to the Senate, we will remain in pro forma session, and no controversial nominees will be allowed to circumvent the confirmation process during the break,” DeMint said.

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84 comments

  1. IF

    Yves, I’ve noticed that whenever I sign a petition that you recommend I also get signed up for a mailing list that keeps spamming me fairly regularly (which is usually nowhere mentioned in advance). Not sure if the petitions are serious or if people are just fishing for audiences. In any case, unsubscribing works.

    1. Rex

      It is a horrible reality that when you respond to a group, that they might put you on a list of potential sympathizers. Who coudda known.

      Life is full of conflicting choices, especially on internet clicking options.

      If unsubscribing works, it seems a small price to pay for voicing on something that is actually being heard to more than a tiny degree.

      1. Steve

        Far better would be polite petition organizers. Simply ask if we want to be on their mailing list. I guarantee that option would have me signing more petitions. As it is I am very selective.

      2. DP

        That’s “if” unsubscribing works and if this organization doesn’t sell your email address to others so you can get bombarded with spam. While I’m a huge fan of Elizabeth Warren, I’m not handing over my email to a group that I know nothing about and that says nothing about how my email address will or won’t be used. No thanks.

        1. Leviathan

          With free email providers like Hotmail, yahoo and google this is no excuse. Set up a new email account every month if you have to and use only for these purposes.

        2. K Ackermann

          I can’t believe by now you haven’t set up a junk email account.

          It’s the ultimate spam filter.

    2. Walter Wit Man

      You’re absolutely correct. These progressive groups are nothing more than a fund raising arm of the Democratic party. It actually causes more harm than it does good to support them.

      As Yves adroitly pointed out, these groups are easily disciplined and actually work to neuter leftward policy change.

      When I quit the Democratic party a couple of years ago I sent e-mails and letters to inform the party why I was quitting them and all I got for it was to be put on their spam lists. I imagine some staffer punishing those that dare complain by doing this.

      One would think that “progressives” would finally reach the point where they can’t take any more abuse and start standing up to their abusers. I mean every time “progressives” get riled up about something, and even when the public is wildly on their side, the adminsitration and a party make certain to teach “progressives” a lesson by rubbing their faces in the dirt and giving them nothing. For example, I thought for sure that Obama would reward progressives for their health care advocacy with a half-baked “public option”–but instead he kept punching them in the face with Stupak amendments and giving other goodies to the right while giving the progressives NOTHING.

      So of course Yves is right and they will get nothing this time around . . . but here we are with people that keep giving money to the Democratic party despite all evidence that they are working for the other side.

      1. NOTaREALmerican

        > So of course Yves is right and they will get nothing this time around . . . but here we are with people that keep giving money to the Democratic party despite all evidence that they are working for the other side.

        Sad, but true; and there’s no other path possible either.

    3. kares

      I will gladly sign a petition recommended by Yves; what is the hang-up if we are on the same side. I end up signing about 30 petitions a week and making phone calls to Congressman and Senators as well.

      1. Walter Wit Man

        Of course you are entitled to your own opinion and I don’t mean to mock your attempt to enact some much needed change, but . . .

        Speaking for me, I think it makes things worse to support captured progressive groups. Apart from the technical issues of getting on spam lists or wondering how these groups use their lists* . . . the politically advocacy they engage in is misguided. They have proved themselves to be doormats, reliable doormats, and therefore until they are able to take an oppositional approach to the corruption in both parties, and stop trying to work with the Democrats, they will only contribute to the problem. We need a different approach and progressive groups that keep people in the Democratic fold are preventing much needed change.

        *My more cynical view is the greater number of names on progressive lists does not convince politicians to fear liberal groups but merely increases the price for the progressive leaders of these organizations to sell out. It creates a more valuable commodity for the Democratic politicians to use for their own purposes–which are antithetical to political goals of most of the people on those lists.

    4. spark

      That’s what a dummy email address, known in spy tradecraft as a “cutout”, is useful for.

      Takes 30 sec to establish one via gmail.

  2. chris4488

    I beg to differ. The Bureau is under the thumb of Geithner, and so Warren’s effectiveness will necessarily be severely restricted in many subtle and not so subtle ways. I live in MA, and we need Warren to run for the Senate seat held by Brown. She could probably win, and in Congress she could actually fight for new legislation to structurally change Wall Street. Her work as Senator would be more important than her work under Geithner, who will turn most or all of her hard work into window dressing.

    1. Yves Smith Post author

      She would not be under Geithner if she were appointed, which I deem very unlikely. The CFPB is in the Fed, it is only in the Treasury in the start-up phase. And it will have its own budget, it is not subject to Congressional or Fed approval.

      Plus she’d have a very powerful bully pulpit. Even if she were hemmed in by the FSOC (which can overturn CFPB policies), there is a lot she could do that would be hard to object to credibly. And the media adores her.

      By contrast, what good would she do in the Senate? if the Dems get their act in gear, they can get the Scott Brown seat back. The Dems were craven when they had 60 seats. It’s the Democrat officialdom, meaning the corporate lackeys, that are pushing her to pursue the Scott Brown seat. It’s a clever way to cashier her without it looking like that.

      As I wrote in an earlier post, the Democrats have an explicit pay to play system for committee appointments. You really need to read this, because this is critical to understanding how money soaked Congressional power is. Her charisma will not get her anywhere inside the Senate.

      http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2011/04/our-polarized-and-money-driven-congress-created-over-25-years-by-republicans.html

      While she may have enough name recognition to get elected, she will be completely unable to raise any money (the serious money is all corporate). So she won’t get on any influential committees.

      She’d be relegated to a leftie gadfly role. We don’t need a more charismatic version of Bernie Sanders.

      She’s better off fighting this fight and losing and figuring out what to do with her media reach. The more her opponents tangle with her, the more her status rises.

      1. Rex

        “The more her opponents tangle with her, the more her status rises.”

        The subtleties of your explanation of the power structures and probable outcomes had evaded me. The quote above does seem to make it worth my while to join the list of names in support of a another probably futile ideal.

        1. Yves Smith Post author

          This is NOT the normal outcome. She is such a natural at media that the more air time she gets, the better she does. One of the Administration’s objectives in getting her signed up as a consultant was to keep her out of the limelight. The Republicans trying to pillory her in public makes her more visible and gives her more stature as someone willing to stand up to them (unlike the no balls Dems). This is why the normal reflexes of trying to put her under hot lights and make her wither are backfiring.

      2. Doug Terpstra

        How convenient! Your link and Ferguson’s INET paper presents the best democracy money can buy in menu form at last, with listed prices, although some simply as “whatever the market will bear”.

        It’s about time! Ever wonder what those sizzling, aromatic dishes are wafting past you into the private dining room? Well, wonder no more. Designed by such luminaries as Delay, Newt, Armey and Norquist, democracy in menu form is the pinnacle of neoliberal economics, where everything is a commodity and every commodity has a clearing price. The thing is, though, in banana republics like ours, prices not listed as “market” are hand-written on little pasted labels to avoid having to reprint the menus every week. And please note that there’s a long waiting list and you’ll need a special broker and extra gratuity to get a table.

    2. Foppe

      I’m sorry, but I really don’t see why Warren would do better under the Democratic party’s thumb in the US Senate than in the CFPB under Timmy. See this and especially this piece by Taibbi on how the Senate “works”.

        1. Moopheus

          Regardless of how much power she’d actually have, the whole resistance (GOP strident, Dems, more passive) to having her in a job for which she is as qualified as anyone could be, just serves to highlight clearly for all to see how much everyone in DC is in thrall to the finance industry.

  3. attempter

    As we noted, we didn’t expect Obama to try to appoint Warren this weekend, and this maneuver does provide Obama with a convenient out. The question is whether anyone on the left will be imaginative enough to make the Republicans look as craven as they are in pretending to be open for business to derail a single tough-minded woman…

    Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) applauded the GOP action to ensure recess appointments would not take place.

    “President Obama has been packing federal agencies with left-wing ideologues, but thankfully he won’t be able to for at least the next week.”

    Looks like my comment here

    http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2011/05/why-are-republicans-so-keen-to-persecute-elizabeth-warren.html#comment-396724

    was right. What a contemptible combination of malevolence and ineptitude he is.

    Who’s “the left”?

    At any rate, Democratic partisans won’t be so imaginative. That’s where the incompetence part comes in. Although Democrats don’t want a real CFPB, they could easily pretend to have one but leave it toothless. But as we see here, they’re incapable of waging partisan warfare.

    As for the alleged tough-minded woman, so far the record doesn’t support such a characterization. Even if you buy into the notion that she can accomplish something real by staying within the system, Warren has conformed and played ball far more than was necessary given her stature. Everyone seems to keep forgetting that she’s supported and shilled for the Bailout throughout. She falls into the “we have some abuses and bad apples” category. Not all that different from Krugman. As Yves said prior to the “tough-minded” comment:

    And if I am proven wrong and she does get the nod, it will be because she has convinced the Administration that she will behave. She may believe that half a loaf is better than none, and that CFPB measures to improve disclosures and make it easier for consumers to comparison shop and file complaints will be hard for the banks to block and will do more to protect consumers than Team Obama might think. So I’m more comfortable with Warren losing the appointment but discomfiting the Administration than with her making whatever pact with the devil she’d have to enter into to win the CFPB job.

    1. Yves Smith Post author

      She is very new to politics and this sort of spotlight and I don’t think understands her power. Almost anyone else would have taken themselves out of the running for the job given how she has been savaged by the banks and Republicans and how little support she has been given by the Administration. She is at least very tough and has been thrown in the deep end of the pool. I think the jury is still out as to whether she is playing ball or trying to bide her time.

      1. Rex

        How about giving her the credit that she may be one of the few people anywhere close to the power structures that actually has a sense of integrity and truth, and is trying to apply it against a sea of scumbaggery.

        I applaud what I see as an act to attempt to confront the forces in control with an honest round of intelligent rebuttal by simple truth and honesty. Not to put her into a potentially dangerous level of context, but I’d liken it a bit to Ghandi’s views:

        “Truth (satya) implies love, and firmness (agraha) engenders and therefore serves as a synonym for force. I thus began to call the Indian movement Satyagraha, that is to say, the Force which is born of Truth and Love or non-violence, and gave up the use of the phrase “passive resistance”, in connection with it, so much so that even in English writing we often avoided it and used instead the word “satyagraha” itself or some other equivalent English phrase.”

        May the force be with her. Onward satyagraha soldiers.

        1. jake chase

          I think we need more satyagraha soldiers in the streets. Making such a fuss about the appointment of one liberal law professor to a toothless agency is silly. The only thing you’ll get is longer unintelligible “disclosures” with your credit card statements, and higher interest rates to pay for writing and printing them.

        2. DownSouth

          Rex,

          Along those same lines, who is the true enemy? Is it the Jim DeMints of the world? Is it the Obamas of the world? Or is it us?

          One of the tenets of nonviolence is that it deems all equally guilty, and holds all equally accountable.

          Nonviolence is “this type of struggle,” said Martin Luther King, “no-cooperation with evil.” The philosophy of nonviolence “says that it is as much a moral obligation to refuse to cooperate with evil as it is to cooperate with good,” explained King. “Noncooperation with evil is as much a moral obligation as the cooperation with good.” Thus King was able to conclude that:

          It may well be that the greatest tragedy of this period of social transition is not the glaring noisiness of the so-called bad people, but the appalling silence of the so-called good people. It may well be that our generation will have to repent not only for the diabolical actions and vitriolic words of the children of darkness, but also for the crippling fears and tragic apathy of the children of light.

          The nonviolent philosophy, when applied to actual politics, looks like this:

          This dearth of positive leadership from the federal government is not confined to one particular political party. Both parties have betrayed the cause of justice. The Democrats have betrayed it by capitulating the prejudices and undemocratic practices of the southern dixiecrats. The Republicans have betrayed it by capitulating to the blatant hypocrisy of right-wing, reactionary northerners.

          [….]

          What we are witnessing today…is a sort of quasi liberalism which is based on the principle of looking sympathetically at all sides. It is a liberalism so bent on seeing all sides that it fails to become committed to either side. It is a liberalism that is so objectively analytical that it is not subjectively committed. It is a liberalism which is neither hot nor cold, but lukewarm.

          I think the appropriate question is: How do we protect Warren’s flank?, or even more importantly: What actions can we take to drive her even more to the side of justice?

          1. Doug Terpstra

            Exquisitely relevant commentary. It’s astonishing how starkly MKL’s indictments convict us today, like the words of a prophet. The absence of any remotely similar figure of clear vision and able leadership today is so dreadfully apparent, especially when similar moral issues are so vivid.

            Why has no one come out of the closet? Why is there not even a glimmer of opposition to Obama’s re-election from within the Dem Party or a third party? Instead of the audacity of hope and transformative change, Obama has conspicuously neutered the progressive black community and co-opted or bewildered much of the unprofessional left media. (Does the Congressional Black Caucus even caucus anymore? You never hear a peep.) Before our eyes, Obama has inexplicably morphed into our Wormtongue as an invincible bulwark against any credible challenge to the global power elite.

          2. DownSouth

            Thanks Lambert,

            Thanks for the links.

            I had read the earlier post before.

            I find what’s going on in Spain to be most intriguing. Could it be the Spanish Spring?

    2. Foppe

      I don’t know if you’ve read her book The Two-Income Trap, but I think you’re quite wrong to suggest that she’s anything like (as useless as) Krugman. It may well be that she doesn’t appreciate how little personal beliefs matters to politicians and how much campaign contributions and party demands do (though she already noted in that book how disappointed she was by Hilary’s sudden turn-around in the case of making a whole bunch of loans immune from bankruptcy declarations in 2005, so I doubt she’s really under many illusions there), and she does seem fond of the middle class meme, but i think the only reason she is still willing to (to some extent) toe the democratic party line is because she isn’t also willing to fight for an end to the combination of a two-party system and privately funded elections, or because she believes that she can still get things done this way.

      1. attempter

        You’re right, comparing her to Krugman is going too far.

        But still, if this is true

        she isn’t also willing to fight for an end to the combination of a two-party system and privately funded elections, or because she believes that she can still get things done this way.

        that’s pretty bad.

        1. Foppe

          It’s mostly speculation on my part. However, you need to realize how different enforcing changes in lender behavior through the CFPB is from changing the fundaments of your democratic republic. The reason she is effective as a proponent of banking reform, and why she could head the CFPB is a. because she has a lot of expertise in that area, b. because it concerns nothing more than adding an (effective) regulatory agency. Therefore, c. it doesn’t require popular support in the same way as changing the electoral system would. When it comes to electoral reform, she has no expertise to bring to the table, and, more importantly, there is nothing in the ‘public mind’ she can appeal to for support: voters simply do not feel the need for electoral reform, and would probably fear any changes in that area simply because they do not understand why it is necessary and how it would affect them.
          To get anything done on this front, you need a far, far broader base of popular support than for the creation of a bureaucratic agency like the CFPB, because it literally means changing the way your democracy works. Now, you may well argue that the people do not realize how strongly the recent SCOTUS decisions will affect future elections, but the problem there is that SCOTUS (still) has institutional legitimacy. Changing the entire electoral system, otoh, cannot happen through institutions, but requires extra-institutional change. The only way to do that is by having grassroots support for such a change, and neither of the two major political parties in the US will ever support any moves to change the system in this fashion. As such, it would be utterly useless for her to expend any kind of effort on it: look what happened to Ralph Nader if you want to know how feasible this kind of reform is. (And see how badly the AV referendum went in the UK to appreciate how hard it is to get people to try something new in election land.) The best thing you could go for (which already is on some people’s minds, as evidenced by sigs I saw on DailyKos last year) is moving towards public campaign financing; but on that topic as well, Warren has nothing to bring to the table by way of believability or credibility, and her efforts would, as such, be wasted..
          The question you should be asking (rather than speculating about Warren’s possible failings as a polymath/Messiah) is why it is so hard to find people with integrity who can speak authoritatively on the other issues affecting the USA… For instance, the only political-institutional critic I can think of off-hand apart from Nader is Greenwald, but he’s problematic for different reasons. So who and where are they?

          1. ex-PFC Chuck

            voters simply do not feel the need for electoral reform, and would probably fear any changes in that area simply because they do not understand why it is necessary and how it would affect them.
            To get anything done on this front, you need a far, far broader base of popular support than for the creation of a bureaucratic agency like the CFPB, because it literally means changing the way your democracy works.

            Some progress on this front is being made here in Minnesota, albeit in fits and starts, in the growing interest in and adoption of Ranked Choice Voting with Instant Runoff in local elections. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instant-runoff_voting) It’s being pitched by combining the general disgust with the limited choices in partisan elections and its cost-saving aspect in local, non-partisan races like city councils and school boards, by eliminating the need for primaries. It’s a long slog, however.

        2. Walter Wit Man

          Exactly attempter. Warren seems like a sincere and intelligent person that can present a powerful argument. She’s about the only politician making the traditional liberal argument. I like her too and sort of, kind of, have “hope” about what she can do.

          But . . . that is all beside the point if she refuses to accept the reality of the system she is attempting to work in. Right now we need someone to take on this corrupt system–not try to work within it. And even the best “liberal” advocates, like Kucinich or Warren, are useless, and indeed actually make things worse, if all they do is corral popular anger in the two-party system.

    3. Doug Terpstra

      Never attribute to “malevolence and ineptitude” what can be more easily explained by malice and incompetence … or simply a case of demon possession :-)

      Of course the utterly cartoonish villainy of the neo-GOP provides corporate democrats briar-patch cover for what Wall Street, the MIC, and AIPAC have ordered the duopoly to do. By the GOP moving to the right of Attila the Hun and Yosemite Sam, the Democrats’ “incompetence” looks somehow reasonable and even heroic, like Maxwell Smart. Obama can now cut 30% of Medicare (as he did with SS FICA taxes) and look like a hero. And even though this treacherous pattern of betrayal has become a set formula, the unprofessional “left” persistently play along.

      Such tacit theatrical collusion with Democrats is likely at play in the boorish grilling Warren was subjected to. Intentional framing or not, it certainly burnished her image, but it’s good to remember she is or was a registered Republican and her worldview is basically conservative. Fresh meat in the DC snake pit will always stands out as wholesome— Warren certainly does— but in time the insidious, systemic venom infects and corrupts nearly everyone. She’s better staying off out of it; better to be outside the pit pissing in.

  4. Cujo359

    I remember the game of political football the nomination of Dawn Johnsen for DoJ/OLC turned out to be. I expected nothing more of the Obama Administration when it came to Elizabeth Warren.

  5. ambrit

    Friends;
    Off the top of my head I’d say the closest thing in American politics to todays dynamic would be the Andrew Jackson “revolution” of the early nineteenth century. We seem to be looking at a major societal shake up. Whether it goes forward or backwards is still up in the air. What we’re looking for here is an effective constituency for “change that kicks you in your a___!”

  6. DownSouth

    • And she refuses to do a Brooksley Born and quietly slink away under fire.

    For an amazing profile of someone who absolutely refused to “slimk away under fire,” there is Dianne Nash, the young college student who participated in the Freedom Rides in 1961.

    Her enemy was the Kennedy administration, and in her you see the immense courage and moral integrity that is required to stand up to the likes of professional politicians like John F. Kennedy and Barak Obama. She even put Martin Luther King to shame, being willing to go where even he was not willing to go.

    There do exist in the world people of enormous courage and enormous will power, and equipped with a moral compass that cannot be compromised.

    The Freedom Riders can be seen here. Highly recommended.

    1. DownSouth

      From the transcript:

      Moses Newson, Journalist, Afro-American (reading): “The courageous Freedom Riders won’t ever be the same. They left Washington, D.C. in good spirits with high hopes in their country and fellow men. But the beatings, the tensions, the shocks, the depth of the hating, the open lawlessness took its toll. It will be a miracle if all their physical and psychological wounds ever heal. The Deep South was that tough.”

      John Seigenthaler, Assistant to RFK: I went to a motel to spend the night. And you know, I thought, ‘What a great hero I am, you know? How easy this was, you know? I just took care of everything the President and the Attorney General wanted done. Mission Accomplished.’ My phone in the hotel room rings and it’s the Attorney General. He has received word from the FBI in Nashville that another wave of Freedom Riders is coming down to Birmingham from Nashville to continue the Freedom Rides. And he opened the conversation, ‘Who the hell is Diane Nash?’

      Slate: May 16th, Nashville, Tennessee, Day 13

      Diane Nash, Student, Fisk University: It was clear to me that if we allowed the Freedom Ride to stop at that point, just after so much violence had been inflicted, the message would have been sent that all you have to do to stop a nonviolent campaign is inflict massive violence. It was critical that the Freedom Ride not stop, and that it be continued immediately.

      Jim Zwerg, Freedom Rider: Students from the Movement in Nashville had been through violence. We had been arrested, we’d all had our lives threatened. We were ones that had not broken. And we were the logical ones to continue the ride.

      Diane Nash, Student, Fisk University: We had had a successful movement the year before, and had desegregated lunch counters. We had been watching the progress of the Freedom Ride. We were fresh troops.

      Frederick Leonard, Freedom Rider: CORE, I think, they didn’t understand. We dealt with violence every day in the South. They didn’t treat us like we were human, they treated us like vicious animals, like they were always on guard, thinking we were gonna do something to them, while they were doing it to us. And CORE, I think, they felt, ‘We’ll go down there, and you know, they’ll let us ride the front of the bus and go into the white station, the white waiting room, and everything will be all right. And we’ll just all the way to New Orleans doing this and then come back to New York and– see we did it!’ It wasn’t like that. You’re saying that you’re gonna start a movement, you’re gonna do something to change this, and then you quit. Your parents tell you, ‘Don’t start something that you can’t finish. Finish it.’

      Diane Nash, Student, Fisk University (Archival): The groups will be dispatched…

      Rev. C.T. Vivian, Freedom Rider: The meeting was called and Diane led it. And I remember Diane saying something was very important. She took a break and said, ‘Go out and let’s think about it for about 10 minutes and come back, and we’ll make the decision.’

      Bernard Lafayette, Jr., Freedom Rider: It was not an easy decision because what it meant was dropping out of school in the midst of our final exams. And for some of us, we were the first generation to go to college. Our parents had really made sacrifices. And we were making a decision to drop out.

      Rev. C.T. Vivian, Freedom Rider: Time was up, everybody came back in. The decision was made to leave that night.

      Jim Zwerg, Freedom Rider: My parents had provided me a wonderful childhood and a tremendous amount of love and support in everything that I had done. But as a white person, I was the primary focus of most of the violence that took place, because I was a disgrace to the white race. I was the traitor. So I knew, if anybody was probably going to get pretty well beaten or killed, it would be me. And I wanted to tell my folks how much I loved them and how much I appreciated what they’d done.

      Singing: Oh freedom….

      Jim Zwerg, Freedom Rider (reading): Tuesday, May 16, 1961. We held two meetings today. The first was at six this morning. The second from seven to one tonight. After much discussion, we decided to continue the Freedom Ride. Of the 18 who volunteered, 10 were chosen. Three females and seven males. We will leave on the Greyhound bus tomorrow morning at either 5:15 or 6:45. We were all again made aware of what we can expect to face: jail, extreme violence, or death.

      Bernard Lafayette, Jr., Freedom Rider: We thought we would divide the group in half. If that group had been arrested, beaten, unable to continue, or even killed, we had a second group that was ready to go. And they knew that no matter what happened — okay — I would bring a second group.

      Diane Nash, Student, Fisk University: The people who were going on the Freedom Ride from Nashville elected me to be the coordinator. That was a really heavy responsibility because the lives and safety of people whom I loved and cared about deeply, and who were some of my closest friends, depended on my doing a good job at that.

      John Seigenthaler, Assistant to RFK: My phone in the hotel room rings and it’s the Attorney General. And he opens the conversation, ‘Who the hell is Diane Nash? Call her and let her know what is waiting for the Freedom Riders.’ So I called her. I said, ‘I understand that there are more Freedom Riders coming down from Nashville. You must stop them if you can.’ Her response was, ‘They’re not gonna turn back. They’re on their way to Birmingham and they’ll be there, shortly.’ You know that spiritual — ‘Like a tree standing by the water, I will not be moved’? She would not be moved. And, and I felt my voice go up another decibel and another and soon I was shouting, ‘Young woman, do you understand what you’re doing? You’re gonna get somebody… Do you understand you’re gonna get somebody killed?’ And, there’s a pause, and she said, ‘Sir, you should know, we all signed our last wills and testaments last night before they left. We know someone will be killed. But we cannot let violence overcome non-violence.’ That’s virtually a direct quote of the words that came out of that child’s mouth. Here I am, an official of the United States government, representing the President and the Attorney General, talking to a student at Fisk University. And she in a very quiet but strong way gave me a lecture.

      Singing: We shall not be moved….

      [….]

      John Seigenthaler, Assistant to RFK: There was a skinny, young kid and he was sort of dancing in front of this young woman, punching her, and I could see, as she turned her head, blood from the nose and mouth. I grabbed her by the wrist over the hood of the car, had her right at the door and she put her hands up on the doorjamb and said, ‘Mister, I don’t want you to get hurt. I’m non-violent, I’m trained to take this. Please, don’t get hurt. We’ll be fine.’ And I said, ‘Get your ass in the car, sister.’ And at that moment, they wheeled me around and they hit me with a pipe. They kicked me under the car and left me there.

  7. Terrorist Borrowers

    Demos and Repubs join hands to squelch dissent:

    “The House today passed the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which contains a dangerous provision that authorizes a worldwide war against terrorism suspects and against nations suspected of supporting them.”

  8. Paul Tioxon

    As noted, the GOP will use procedural tactics, by keeping the US Senate in session, technically, by shuttling near by sock puppets from VA and MD to conduct some nominal Senate business, presumably between bar b q duty. And it does not only affect Liz Warren, judges and other agency personnel are backed up, waiting confirmation hearings. It seems you can get more republican senators together in one room to attack the National Labor Relations Board, than you can to question someone on the way to the higher circuit federal court districts.

    But let’s look at what all of the fuss is about. The bureau is up and running, out the treasury, until it can operate out of the fed. The CFPB has an operational web site that is doling out sage wisdom for Joe the plumber, Suzie soccer mom, but sadly nothing for Derivative Dimon.

    Here: http://www.consumerfinance.gov/the-bureau/

    But why do we need this? Why is the GOP so crazed? Well, the GOP wants to disestablish the liberal nation state, taking apart the bureaucratic mechanism agency by agency, bureau by bureau. As part of the let’s keep the government open budget showdown, among other things, it defunded mortgage counseling for not only people in foreclosure but also, seniors who need independent info about reverse mortgages.

    http://www.philly.com/philly/columnists/al_heavens/20110508_On_the_House__Housing_counseling_was_sacrificed_to_keep_federal_government_open.html

    So Liz hasn’t been kidding all of these years about the middle class having the financial deck stacked against them, with not much independent non profit making sources of advice worth a damn. She has garnered so much recent support, a state head of a bankers association has formally endorsed and pleaded for Obama to recess appoint her.

    http://www.philly.com/philly/blogs/consumer/Okla-banker-once-a-Warren-foe-urges-her-appointment.html

    http://motherjones.com/politics/2011/05/elizabeth-warren-cfpb-community-banks

    Thanks to observers of the obvious, it seems she is on a clear path to serve as the appointed director, operating out of the Fed. The GOP, like Tina Turner, never, ever does nothing….nice…and…easy, but it is the will of the people they are trying to thwart with their exercise in futile obstructionist anarchy. And it won’t work.

    1. Dick Nixon

      They don’t need to take agencies “apart”, they own agencies. Take the OCC or previously, the stooge at the OTS. Surprised that these agencies weren’t gutted and folks fired the moment the “change” bought itself back into office?

      Are Americans delusional or hopelessly, faithfully stupid?
      Who doesn’t have a problem with what we did/are doing in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Libya, Iraq? No problem with torture, no problem with allowing insurance companies to legislate, no problem with leading the world in throwing people into prison, no problem with non-existant workers rights, no problem with our great Casinos?
      No problem with the enourmous systemic cancer made all the more obvious via the housing bubble, including non-existant due process to outright violence against the victims? And still no one has seen justice. Thanks to Politicians we have no cramdown, and the reason is that it simply isn’t allowed.

      1. Paul Tioxon

        If the GOP owns, I’m sorry, the cointelpro goes so very deep, co-owns with the Ds all of the agencies, then why do conservatives fall over them selves, to run for office? And once there, why do they bother to expend so much energy defunding, proposing to defund and propose to end all and everything federal as much as possible, decade after decade? Why are there even Billionaires, like Bloomberg, running for office, fulfilling the statutory limit, then, because it is so easy to own the government apparatus, and so hard to run a business, CHANGES THE GOD DAMN LAW SO HE CAN HAVE A THIRD TERM IN OFFICE? Perhaps the actual owners of society think that micro as well as macro management is preferred? The Utra Rich contest for elected offices on the Federal and State level and even win. If they already own the government, why do they now have to personally run to displace the chance of anyone but the wealthiest and most influential from the corporate world inhabit democratically controlled public offices? Meg Whitman, Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum, Pat Toomey, Ross Perot, Jon Corzine, Rockefeller etc.

        http://abcnews.go.com/Business/story?id=86881&page=

        1. ella

          “And once there, why do they bother to expend so much energy defunding, proposing to defund and propose to end all and everything federal as much as possible, decade after decade? ”

          It’s funny isn’t it? The more they “defund”, the bigger the deficit hole. Decade after decade.

          Every time people are too stupid to see through the act. Every election people forget everything they have ever learned in their lives.

    2. propertius

      As noted, the GOP will use procedural tactics, by keeping the US Senate in session, technically, by shuttling near by sock puppets from VA and MD to conduct some nominal Senate business, presumably between bar b q duty. And it does not only affect Liz Warren, judges and other agency personnel are backed up, waiting confirmation hearings. It seems you can get more republican senators together in one room to attack the National Labor Relations Board, than you can to question someone on the way to the higher circuit federal court districts.

      Well, that’s certainly the spin. The reality is that Reid didn’t even try to adjourn, because if he had the guy in the White House would have had to make a decision on Warren – something that must be avoided at all costs.

      The Dems get to whine to the base that the “bad ol’ GOP” prevented a recess appointment, and that they need more money to win more seats so that they can fight the good fight as they did in 2009 and 2010. The Republicans can spin the tale that a few hardy, freedom-loving individuals stood against the Marxist tide and preserved the free enterprise system – but that they need more contributions to restore the Gilded Age.

      They’ll all gather at the next National Prayer Breakfast and joke about how they really put one over on the rubes.

      1. BondsOfSteel

        Yea, I’m confused how the minorty GOP kept the senate in session. You can’t fillibuster adjourment resolutions, right?

        Anyone know?

        BTW, after my senator voted for extending the Bush tax cuts, she sent me a fundraising letter saying how the ‘tricky’ GOP forced her hand and how she needs support fighing aganist extending them in the future. Right.

  9. Andy

    Could someone point me to more on the administration getting “nominally liberal organizations” defunded?

  10. Valissa

    This post implies that it still makes some sort of significant difference which party is in power… that there is a savior or hero figure who can start rolling back the tide of creeping bipartisan authoritarianism and looting-corruption. It must be nice to still “believe” there is “hope.” While I can understand this sort of attitude on some of the liberal blogs I still read, I find it pretty naive here with this group.

    Btw, I will happily re-vote for Scott Brown next year for a variety of reasons (strategic, entertaining, humorous). It’s quite a thing to behold to watch my liberal friends and various blog commenters freak out when I say that… and it gives me a good laugh. It really confuses them that I voted for Deval Patrick twice to boot… LOL… Anybody who thinks having 60 Dems in teh Senate will help anyone but the wealthy, or in any way change the existing system is seriously deluding themselves. Many of those Dems are blue dogs and might as well be Republicans anyway, and the rest are mostly compromised by the lobbyists that fund their campaigns.

    The Dem-Repub, left-right polarity is NOT the main game right now, it’s just a sideshow. When enough people realize that then finally we might see some change. Then perhaps folks will focus on other much more relevant polarities… the individual vs. corporation, and little people vs the wealthy ,and democracy vs authoritarian oligarchy-plutocracy.

    1. rainer

      The world is heading for ecological collapse. No one person can stop it. Some very wealthy people are stealing as many of the world’s resources as they can as a buffer against it. By the time the rest of the world dialectically overcomes those false polarities that you mention, it will be too late.

      Just saying.

    2. Walter Wit Man

      I feel the same way although I guess I don’t find it so humorous. It really does suck the hope out of life when even people that claim to be on your side keep getting suckered by a really obvious scam. Both parties have succeeded in killing hope for any sort of economic justice.

      The Patriot Act was just extended under duress, we are engaging in endless wars, unemployment is sky high, and our politicians are coming together to cut social security and health care.

      They just throw in these silly fights to distract us and teach the left that they will be crushed and will be given nothing–even when their demands are popular and good policy. They want to make it seem like an impossibility to raise taxes on the rich, for instance. Never gonna happen hippy, so just shut up and vote Democrat. The real politics is convincing people that the sideshow is the main attraction while hiding the real machinations of government (servicing the rich).

      1. Valissa

        Yeah, I used to be more politically earnest and therefore often distressed about the state of things. Detachment and humor are wonderful antidotes (as is reading lots of history)… and learning to appreciate the absurdity and kabuki theater takes some time but is a worthwhile investment in one’s sanity, IMO. Besides, satire is almost always more effective than earnestness.

        1. Walter Wit Man

          Good advice. I guess I use detachment more than humor. I used to be suckered by these petitions and progressive pleas for “hope” and liberal change as well. Now, kind of like Yves demonstrates in this post, I can face reality and realize that Obama and the Democrats don’t want to change, e.g. to nominate Warren. And when the Kabuki gets too much to handle I tune out.

          But hey, I hear you on shocking my “progressive” friends about my new view on Republicans. The fear-mongering and tribal pleas simply don’t work on me anymore and my “progressive” friends wonder why I’m not in a tizzy about the latest thing Rand Paul said or Sarah Palin tweeted. And I agree with you that it is totally justifiable for a lefty to vote Republican. It certainly isn’t going to make things worse. And I guess I do confess to enjoying watching progressives wave their arms and froth at the mouth that someone on the left doesn’t think that the Republicans are more evil than the Democrats.

    3. Yves Smith Post author

      I said no such thing. There is so much projection around Warren it isn’t funny.

      She’s embarrassing the Administration and Congress. Google Otpor. They used humor and pranks as a starter to achieve the same end, to show that the authority structure is not all powerful.

  11. Chris Van Democratollen

    WASHINGTON (AP) — Minutes before a midnight deadline, President Barack Obama signed into law a four-year extension of post-Sept. 11 powers to search records and conduct roving wiretaps in pursuit of terrorists.
    (or anyone else, aside from the owner/ruler class)

  12. Pepe

    While it’s true that the Senate will not be adjourning for the upcoming break, Harry Reid could have made the motion and made everyone sit in the chamber for a few days to see how serious they were.

    Neither party wants her. She’s just losing credibility by staying inside. Better for her to be outside the tent pissing in at this point.

    1. Valissa

      Exactly so! My personal fantasy about Elizabeth Warren is that she heads up a non-partisan non-profit whose purpose is to educate the public about money, debt, finance, economics and what’s really going on in the bankster’s world and how the little people are getting screwed by that and what needs to be done to rebuild the middle class.

      She would be great doing educational videos on YouTube and maybe eventually more people would even know who she is (outside of financial, economic and certain blogger circles). If I recall correctly she was originally a moderate Republican some years ago before that groups headed for extinction.

      Knowledge is Power and people need to understand the depths of the kleptocracy before there is the remotest chance of attempting to change it. As long as Warren is on the ‘inside’ she will have to play their game to some extent in order to gain any power. Better for her and all of us for her power to grow outside The System.

    2. shoogie

      “Better for her to be outside the tent pissing in at this point.”

      I’m sorry but this statement brings to mind the Rick Santorum headline highlighted on Rachael Maddow, “Dog pee can’t stop Santorum.”

      I can’t imagine that is the sort of image an ex-sunday school teacher, law professor and middle-class advocate for consumer protection needs. Nor have I seen any evidence that Ms. Warren would be at all interested in running for Senate.

      A Consumer Protection Bureau has been a long-term dream for this woman, so I expect she will keep working towards seeing it realized. Given what I’ve heard from her so far, I would imagine that she feels the agency itself is more important than the agency’s head but I could be wrong. I personally hope that she succeeds, but I fear so long as we continue to focus on media-generated concepts such as “who plays well to the audience” we will keep finding ourselves with skilled actors to fill posts rather than appropriate people to carry out jobs they understand well and believe in.

      Democratically speaking, it behooves us to support those kinds of folks just as tenaciously as they support us.

      1. Pepe

        She’s been almost completely taken out of the picture by the administration. She won’t get the CFPB. If she really wants to raise attention to the problems at hand, being inside the administration won’t work.

        And by playing ball with the administration, she loses credibility. As she should.

      2. Pepe

        And I do support them as much as they support us – none.

        Warren did good work in the Senate, and as a law professor. She still views the administration as an ally? Or at least as a vehicle for reform? Risible.

    1. Valissa

      Why do you believe she will be able to accomplish anything in the Senate (except to appease ‘the base’)? The senate is not a place that instigates changes, it is The Establishment. Did Obama ever ‘change’ anything in the Senate? It takes a long time to build up seniority in the Senate and by then the person has become part of the Establishment in order to survive. Why do you think Jim Webb did not run for re-election? He was attmepting to do some great work on prison reform and got pretty much no where with it.

      Putting Warren in the Senate would be a terrible waste of her talents. The only reason you folks want her to run is to oust Scott Brown because you think that will make some sort of difference (other than in your minds). It’s very seductive to root for the ‘good guy’ and get that temporary (but meaningless) thrill of victory.

  13. Norman

    Because it’s Memorial Day Weekend, because I’m an ex-U.S.Marine, come from a family whose members have served this country ever since they were thrown out with the Pilgrims, I think that Ms Warren should instead run for P.O.T.U.S., because she could be just what this country needs, and we all know this country needs a radical change before it collapse’s from the present corruption.

    1. john

      Norman,
      I’ll be happy to help you organize a “draft Warren” committee, what shall we call our party? Democrat and Republican are taken.

  14. Eric

    Much prefer a normal nomination and consideration process for Warren than a recess appointment. Just make the nomination and support it is what this administration should be doing. Mitch McConnel could really create tensions among Democrats by threatening to not filibuster!

    1. Peter T

      I don’t think McConnel would dare not to filibuster Warren’s appointment; he would get too much heat from his base if he hadn’t organized a filibuster and she is then elected. Nominating Warren might be a good move to show the Republican in an unsympathetic light during the hearings. Obama could recess appoint her anyhow if there hasn’t been an up-or-down vote but only a filibuster, couldn’t he?

  15. Francois T

    “And if I am proven wrong and she does get the nod, it will be because she has convinced the Administration that she will behave.”

    Sorry Yves but I disagree with this assessment. If she gets the nod, it won’t be because she saw the light, but because the Administration felt the heat.

    Try to imagine what would be the reaction of, not only the progressive groups, but a LOT of ordinary people, if Obama was choosing someone else; no amount of threats, cajoling and rhetorical bullshit would be enough for damage control. It would be the DEFINITIVE proof that Obama is genetically a serial caver, somebody you can bend at will if you play hardball politics. And someone who despise his base so much that he can’t be bothered to give them ONE item they’re craving for. No supporter of the Administration would have any credibility to try to smooth talk the hoi polloi.

    Just look at the way she mollify people of teevee. She pierce the screen with her honesty, eloquence and down to earth common sense.

    It’s not me saying that: she’s got an open invitation at Morning Joe for crying out loud. Any MSM outlet that was rude or condescending to her got jack hammered with a multiple rabbit punch they still remember, like the team at Planet Money on NPR. Patrick McHenry will (not “may”) lose his seat for the way he treated her during last week hearing. Note the incredible outpouring of support she gets every time any article is posted on her pretty much anywhere on the Internet. (I exclude asylum-hosting sites like RedState, Michelle Malkin or Fix News, of course)

    Whether he likes it or not, Obama is royally toasted: Appoint her and Timmy Gangster and his handlers will be angry. DO not appoint her and taste the raw fear of living through a re-election where your base positively hate you.

    My money is on Prof. Warren. Bets starts at 10$

    Any taker?

    1. Walter Wit Man

      Will this be the straw that broke the camel’s back for you if you are wrong? Instead of money how about you promise to quit supporting the Democratic party if you are wrong on this one? I would take the other side of the bet and if I were wrong I would promise to again have a little bit of hope that Obama and the Democrats can be shamed into giving a symbolic crumb to progressives (because the only way I see you winning this bet is if Obama nominates her officially, rather than by recess, so that he has an excuse when she is rejected).

      No offense intended (b/c I was there too), but your post could have been written about every progressives initiative the last 2 years (and longer than that really). I remember making the same promises to quit Obama and the Democrats if they crossed a particular line (or pleading with the Democrats that the “base” will leave them, if not me personally). I finally followed through on my promises and it feels liberating. Because the Democrats and Obama will continue to cross those lines.

      Look, it’s now part of the dynamic that they can’t give progressives an INCH. I used think that it would at least be smart politics for Obama and the Democrats to throw progressives symbolic bones–heck, progressives seem to be perfectly happy if Obama simply gives a speech giving rhetorical support to one of their issues. It seemed to be a win win for him: he could give progressives a rhetorical bone while giving the true masters of the country the real bone–and everyone would be happy. But now I see that they need to rub progressives’ faces in the dirt so they think it is totally hopeless. They don’t even get the rhetorical bone–they get mocked and shunned.

      And yet there is no breaking point for too many progressives. What are progressives going to do if Obama yet again lets them down? I disagree with your assessment that progressives will finally punish Obama for this betrayal; they have been successfully disciplined and are actually complicit at this point. I see no life in the progressive movement that isn’t dedicated to supporting a dying and criminally corrupt party.

  16. propertius

    Sorry Yves but I disagree with this assessment. If she gets the nod, it won’t be because she saw the light, but because the Administration felt the heat.

    Which, of course, is why the Senate didn’t adjourn and the President got to play ping-pong undisturbed by the responsibilities of office.

  17. Walter Wit Man

    I’m confused by The Hill story re the Senate not adjourning . . . the story says that it’s a GOP effort to prevent recess nominations by the president by doesn’t the president’s party hold the Senate?

    Okay, I’m not confused. I see clearly: the Kabuki play in this instance is the usual plot. The Democrats would sure like to appoint a consumer guardian for the people, I mean they really, really, want to. But, those mean Republicans are so over the top, so unreasonable, so CRAZY that they simply won’t allow it. Therefore, the Democrats are doing the best they can, but will simply have to settle for something else. They need to keep their powder dry to do some really amazing liberal stuff later, and they need to protect vulnerable members, and it was a short break anyway, so . . . . whatever.

    And everyone in Washington pretends that this is the reality. I mean c’mon, can’t the Hill at least report why a Democratic Senate is preventing the Democratic president from conducting recess nominations? I won’t look but I assume the “progressive” blogs are also repeating the same cover story that The Hill is–that the GOP obstructed or the Democrats caved and shouldn’t have (cue up the sternly worded, yet futile, letters and emails again).

    1. allen

      pssst, Walter. Don’t tell anyone I told you this. It’s supposed to be secret. I heard a rumor that Obama was thinking of maybe in his last 10 seconds in office of passing some pretty liberal legislation having to do with earthworm habitat restoration on a tiny patch of the Whitehouse lawn. But remember, it’s top secret. Mums the word.

      1. Walter Wit Man

        Yeah, he gave a speech a few years back in a closed meeting of the Lumbricus Terrestris Society and there is a video of him saying that he supports the full restoration of earthworm habitat and will work for that goal if elected president. The only reason he can’t come out and propose direct legislation right now is because the right wing would make a huge deal out of it. And Obama simply had to appoint that Aves Society person to the terrestrial regulatory position. He’s playing rope a dope.

        But yeah, if we make him do it, if we do our part to convince the country (beyond the 75% that support us now), he will have no other choice but to enact full earthworm restoration. If he doesn’t do it we have no one to blame but ourselves.

      2. Lloyd C. Bankster

        allen said: “I heard a rumor that Obama was thinking of maybe in his last 10 seconds in office of passing some pretty liberal legislation having to do with earthworm habitat restoration on a tiny patch of the Whitehouse lawn.”

        I’ve heard the rumor and will make certain it never happens. The instructions are for Daily Kos and the ObamaBots to keep this last hope alive by any and all means, right up until the last minute of the Obama administration.

        But in the final minute, Obama has been instructed to torch the earthworm habitat, salt it, and finally poison it with gallons of hydrogen cyanide.

  18. lambert strether

    When Warren advocates turning the banks into regulated public utilities come back and talk to me.

    Making the paperwork clear just isn’t doing it for me, and so far, that’s what CPFB is about.

    1. shoogie

      Taking one step at a time works for me.

      Being able to read and comprehend a legally-binding financial contract that I am supposed to help cognitively impaired senior citizens or even friends and neighbors understand seems like a miracle at this point.

  19. Godwin

    So far, the Administration has been able to neuter critics on the left by getting nominally liberal organizations defunded if they don’t toe the party line. They started with smaller groups early on to demonstrate the costs of defiance and I have been told of much large, more established groups coming into the Administration’s crosshairs as part of its pre-2012 brush-clearing.

    This is worthy of a separate post.

  20. readerOfTeaLeaves

    I’ve been following the Google News feeds on this since Tuesday and boyohboyohboy has it been intriguing.

    I started out thinking that she was up against the $62,000,000+ spent on lobbying in DC by the FIRE sector last year. (Number came from Elliot Spitzer’s commentary at CNN.)

    I’ve concluded she’s the $700,000,000,000 gal.
    That figure comes from the TARP bailout, which sits atop a sea of mortgage fraud — much of which could have been avoided if buyers knew just how badly they were going to get screwed.

    So my view is: does Obama have the political cajones to face down those who want to make billions by perpetrating fraud? Or not.

    Prof Warren has morphed, apparently unwittingly, into the $7 billion gal.

    Which is why I smell fear among the FIRE lobbyists, and their toadies in both parties.

    This is one to watch.
    Thanks, Yves.

  21. ECON

    To a foreigner north of USA, it is quite evident that the soul of America is dead. Money owns all political structures of government and the stench of the parties wrt E. Warren and potential appointment epitomizes the banana republic it is.

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