Less than twenty four hours after their Healthcare victory in the House of Representatives, the Obama administration’s on the road again – this time touting the importance of financial reform.
Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner told the conservative leaning think-tank the American Enterprise Institute he will not accept a bill that doesn't provide strong protection for consumers and constraints on risk-taking large institutions. Mr Geithner said:
"At its core is this basic sense of deep injustice and that moral failing of the system - the political opposition to doing things that look like they're going to benefit banks even if they're necessary to save the system is what leads most governments to screw up most financial crises - I apologise for saying it that way."
Geithner himself is no stranger to that sentiment .... accused by his critics of being too cozy with the financial sector at the height of the crisis when he was head of the New York Federal Reserve.
His address Monday came on the same day the powerful Senate Banking Committee convened for a vote on financial reform.
On the table is a package of measures that includes unprecedented powers to break-up large financial firms thought to be at risk of failure, the ability to force the financial industry to pay for its most spectacular failures and the creation of an independent financial watchdog.
Chris Dodd, Democratic Congressman and committee chairman said:
"Today a full three years after we began to study the crisis and after a tremendous amount of work of discussion and study ... we have a bill in front of us.
Republicans are opposed to many of the measures but despite their opposition, Democrats won the vote 13-to-10 to get the bill out of committee and onto the main floor of the Senate where a tough fight is expected … just like healthcare reform.
Richard Shelby, Republican Congressman said:
"Although I have raised a number of serious concerns I remain today optimistic that we can over time reach an agreement that will garner broad bi-partisan support - I just don't believe we're quite there yet."
Along with immigration reform, financial reform is shaping up to be the next big fight the Obama administration has on its hands.
Obama and Geithner seek nothing less than to re-write the rules of capitalism and make the U.S. a world leader in stopping the kind of excesses that led to the global collapse of 2008.
For that to be truly effective though, the rules of capitalism will have to be rewritten not just for the United States … but the rest of the global financial community too.
Content on this website is for general information purposes only. Your comments are provided by your own free will and you take sole responsibility for any direct or indirect liability. You hereby provide us with an irrevocable, unlimited, and global license for no consideration to use, reuse, delete or publish comments, in accordance with Community Rules & Guidelines and Terms and Conditions.
![[QODLink]](http://english.aljazeera.net/mritems/Images/2012/5/11/2012511172447168734_16.jpg "Gaddafi clung to a fading reality")
