House Financial Reform Bill

I haven’t had time to digest the details yet, but it looks as if the proposed reform misses the key point: our banks are just too big. We can no longer afford to save them. They destroyed our economy last year and have thrown us deeply into debt. We cannot afford a repeat. Perhaps we should announce that and let the credit markets work out how to deal with the withdrawal of our safety net.

Nah. That would mean the market would have to work. And we know it doesn’t.

On a brighter note: I love the fact that the Republicans are already attacking the reform as a big government bust that will reduce credit availability, lose us jobs and otherwise spread mayhem throughout the economy.

The New York Times has a story on the reform bill and has the following wonderful quote:

House Republicans harshly criticized the Democratic legislation, saying it could restrict the availability of credit, cause job losses and necessitate future bailouts of troubled businesses.

‰ÛÏThis bill will have severe negative consequences on our financial sector and economy as whole,‰Û? said Representative Leonard Lance, Republican of New Jersey.

[my emphasis added to the original]

No such damage could ever be caused by a deregulated system of course.

Imagine what we could achieve if our representatives could think. Amazing.