Financial Reform

Mitt Romney introduced his economic reform plan today in USAToday. The 59 points follow:

Every Friday, Jennifer Rubin, the Right Turn blogger on the Washington Post web site, asks her readers a question. On Sundays, she picks one or two answers posted by commenters on her blog and comments on the thread that she started.

This week's question: "What does [Rick] Perry need to do to maintain his momentum and begin to minimize doubts about his electability?"

This morning she picked two answers. My post about my eight ideas for stimulating consumer spending and hiring was one of the two answers she picked out of a bunch of good comments that followed her question. That thread is here. My slightly edited and expanded version of my comment, which I posted on this blog, is here.

Rubin summarized the answers this way:

I was struck by two important assumptions running through the answers. First, unlike many in the right blogosphere, the readers did not dismiss criticisms of Perry out of hand or characterize them as creations of the liberal media. They want to put Perry through the paces, and they understand there are real concerns about his candidacy. Second, it is apparent that readers are sick of platitudes and one-liners; they want detailed proposals and an explanation as to how the candidate’s background equips him to deal with our current national challenges. If Right Turn readers are representative of the Republican primary electorate, the party is in very good hands. The primary process is a time for not only choosing, but probing and testing.

It’s the last week of August, only a few weeks until Coloradans begin voting, and second-term U.S. Rep. Ed Perlmutter (CD-7) doesn’t know what to say.

Why is Rep. Ron Paul so critical of the Federal Reserve Board and so sold on gold?

Because he thinks the U.S. monetary system is being mismanaged? Obviously.

Because he has invested hundreds of thousands of dollars in gold stocks. Obviously.

Should a Washington Post report that Paul has been preaching his book and encouraging speculators to buy gold make his Colorado friends like Republican Senate candidate, Ken Buck, suspicious of Paul’s economic proclamations? Obviously.

The lede graphs from WaPo:

Taking the gloves off, former Colorado Lieutenant Governor Jane Norton said in an 85-minute interview in her Centennial office today that Ken Buck, her opponent for the Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate, is the real Washington insider and that she’s the fiscal conservative in the race.

“I am not the Washington insider in this race. That would be Ken Buck. Ken has a Washington insider 527 running over $1 million of ads on his behalf. And he received over a third of all his donations from employees of one company that relies on stimulus money and millions of dollars of special interests contracts,” Norton said.

(Her campaign provided me with a list of employees of Greeley-based Hensel Phelps Construction Co. who have contributed $141,800 to Buck’s Senate campaign.)

In reply to the Buck campaign’s charges that Norton is a Washington insider because she is backed by Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) and is related to a Washington lobbyist, Norton said, “Ken Buck was Governor Bill Ritter’s best man. If we’re going to play the guilt by association game, that’s an interesting connection.”

Like Buck, Norton says she would not vote for a bill that would help Colorado if it included a tax increase.

Appointed Democrat Senator Michael Bennet “is totally out of touch with Colorado values. . . He’s a rubber stamp for anything the Obama administration wants.”

As executive director of the Colorado Dept. of Public Health and Environment between 1999 and 2002, Norton said, “My general fund request was down 28% when I left office. We eliminated programs that were not authorized by the state statute or in the state constitution.”

Norton also noted that when she ran for lieutenant governor, she took an unpaid leave of absence from her state job. Ken Buck continues to serve as the district attorney of Weld county even though he’s often absent so that he can attend campaign events, she said.

She also clarified her role at the Englewood-based Medical Group Management Association, where she was in charge of monitoring changes in states’ laws and regulations and informing managers of some 7,000 medical group practices about how they could comply with new state laws. She wasn’t in charge of the MGMA’s lobbyist in Washington and she never managed lobbyists or served as a lobbyist, she said.

“I have never been a lobbyist,” she said.

To see the 27 questions and answers, please click on the hed of this story. If you’re viewing this story at Rocky Mountain Right or Peoples Press Collective, go to www.businessword.com.

Senator Chris Dodd (D-CT) is being forced to retire because he allegedly took mini bribes from a mortgage bank. Yet President Barack Obama is working with Dodd to “reform” financial and credit market laws and regulations. 

It’s no surprise, then, that the Dodd bill is as intellectually corrupt as its creator. And it’s no surprise that the bill would add bureaucracies that would force large banks and manufacturers to hire more lobbyists who would pour more money into the campaign fundraisers held by presidential candidates and members of Congress. Big government is corrupt government, and the financial reform bill would make the Federal government even more corrupt than it already is. By “corrupt,” I mean that politicians work for lobbyists and special interests who contribute to their campaigns, not for their constituents and country.

Here are links to some articles that discuss the weaknesses in the financial reform legislation being pushed by Obama and Dodd:

CBO cost estimate, S. 3217, Restoring American Financial Stability Act of 2010. CBO. 26 pp.

CBO confirms you’re on the hook for Wall Street bailout bill. The Heritage Foundation.

Democrats reach deal on tough derivative law. By Ronald D. Orol.

Financial reform’s big unknowns. By Robert J. Samuelson.

Senator Dodd’s Regulation Plan: 14 fatal flaws. By James Gattuso, The Heritage Foundation.

Dodd’s job-killer. By Mark A. Calabria, Cato Institute.

Back to basics on financial reform. By Niall Ferguson & Ted Forstmann. April 23, http://www.Opinionjournal.com.

The new master of Wall Street. Obama surveys the financial kingdom that may soon be his. Editorial. http://www.opinionjournal.com. April 23, 2010.

Crisis and ideology: The Administration’s financial reform legislation. By Peter J. Wallison, American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research.

Yes, it’s a bailout bill. By Phillip Swagel. The American, the journal of the American Enterprise Institute.

Do you have any reforms in size XL? Gretchen Morgenson, NYT.