Free Republic

Rep. Frank Warns on Consequences of Overreacting; Regulators Fire Back Politicians are putting pressure on regulators to ease up on small community banks across the U.S., a move some say could increase the cost of cleaning up the financial crisis. Last week, House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank (D., Mass.) sent a letter to the country's top bank regulators, including Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. Chairman Sheila Bair, urging them to "show some temperance in their regulation of traditional banks." One common complaint from lawmakers is that regulators' tough examinations are making banks reluctant...

To appreciate the extent to which the Environmental Protection Agency under President Obama is a regulator reborn, consider this: EPA officials have begun to cut air pollution by invoking the Clean Water Act. Long quiescent under President George W. Bush, the agency is churning out initiatives and regulations at a pace that pleases its friends in the environmental movement and frightens many in the business community. In the past eight months, the EPA has proposed eight major new regulations for air pollutants that would strengthen the nation's clean air laws almost overnight. In contrast, in the first eight months of...

In mid-August, the National Marine Fisheries Service closed down the red snapper fishery, then a couple of weeks ago they took away the greater amberjack with a week left in the Fishing Rodeo - Destin's longest running fishing tournament. I'm out here criticizing the 'do-gooder,' ” who thinks they are helping the fishery with the closures, Brunson said. “I call 'em educated idiots. They ought to listen to someone who's been fishing for more than 80 years.” “The amberjack is what tore me up,” said the 96-year-old Capt. Reddin “Salty” Brunson, who was sporting a protest sign attached to his...

There's nothing neutral about the Obama administration's push for net neutrality. Do you suppose that, periodically, an ad appears in the Washington Post that reads this way? Wanted. Congressional Legislation Naming Consultant (GS-9). Must be able to craft titles for legislation coming before the House and Senate. Must have a thorough understanding of the English language, and the ability to design titles counter-reflective of their intent. All applicants will be screened to assure no more than moderate recreational use of creative enhancement drugs. Preferential treatment will be given to those between 28-35 years of age who like comfort food. Comfort...

Barney Frank Frank: "We Are Trying On Every Front To Increase The Role Of Government" (Video)

A new bill in Congress to increase financial regulation would allow the federal government to seize institutions deemed “too big to fail” if Treasury saw a large enough risk of collapse. McClatchy reports that some on Capitol Hill have begun to refer to it as a “death panel” for banks, apparently more as a joke than a concern. Have any of them actually read the Constitution, especially the Fifth Amendment? Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, worked over the weekend and throughout Monday to draft the legislation. It would provide the government with first-ever...

Give Ed Schultz credit for something: on his MSNBC show this evening, he hosted an amusing smackdown between Barney Frank and Ralph Nader, perhaps the two most morose public men in America. For once, Barney was attacked from the left. The gist of Ralph's rebuke was that Frank hasn't gone far enough in regulating the financial industry. Frank was finally so provoked that he claimed/admitted that when it comes to regulation, Democrats are "trying on every front to increase the role of government." View video here.

US Is Seeking Tougher Powers In Too-Big-To-Fail Legislation Published: Monday, 26 Oct 2009 | 11:27 AM ET Text Size By: Albert Bozzo Senior Features Editor The Obama administration and House Democrats have made major changes to proposed legislation giving the federal government new powers to wind down the businesses of too-big-too-fail financial firms. The revised legislation, which is now being finalized, will be made public late today or early tomorrow, according to sources. The key changes in what is known as resolution authority affect compensation of creditors, shareholders and management, as well as the role of the Federal Reserve in...

U.S. Senator John McCain has introduced legislation that would block the U.S. Federal Communications Commission from creating new net neutrality rules, on the same day that the FCC took the first step toward doing so. McCain on Thursday introduced the Internet Freedom Act, which would keep the FCC from enacting rules prohibiting broadband providers from selectively blocking or slowing Internet content and applications. Net neutrality rules would create "onerous federal regulation," McCain said in a written statement. McCain protested the FCC's proposal that wireless broadband providers be included in the net neutrality rules. The wireless industry has "exploded over the...

An article that details the New York Court of Appeals case that dealt with the raising of rent amounts for a group of apartments in the Stuyvesant district. This is what happens when you institute a price floor (see comment for below) First three paragraphs: Tenants and landlords spent much of Thursday struggling to figure out what the state high court’s ruling on the future of Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village meant for all types of New Yorkers. Real estate moguls feared the news would cripple their industry, and tenants worried about their rents. Despite the lack of clarity,...

The Pittsburgh Post Gazette reports on a study released on-line in The Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology which indicates that physiology, not public policy, determines a human’s daily sodium intake. This research likely represents a important step forward in light of past and current efforts by government agencies and government funded organizations to set progressively restrictive guidelines for salt intake among U.S. citizens.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has proposed tough new measures to reduce the health toll from air pollution around the Great Lakes by forcing lake freighters to stop burning dirty bunker fuel. But the plan has an unusual opponent: The Canadian embassy in Washington has quietly asked the EPA to weaken the measures, arguing that they could harm trade. It wants ships to be allowed to continue using the high-polluting fuel and to instead install smokestack scrubbers that would clean up their emissions. The Canadian recommendation, if accepted, could delay the clean-air measure for years, because the technology for the...

press boxThe FTC's Mad Power Grab The commission's preposterous new endorsement guidelines.By Jack ShaferPosted Wednesday, Oct. 7, 2009, at 6:29 PM ET If you're a blogger and you write about goods or services—and what blogger doesn't write about books, movies, music, theater, restaurants, home theaters, laptops, manicures, clothing, tutoring, bicycles, cars, boats, cameras, strollers, watches, lawn care, pharmaceuticals, gourmet food, maid service, hair care, concerts, banking, shipping, or septic tank service from time to time?—then you've just made yourself vulnerable to an investigation from the Federal Trade Commission.In new guidelines (PDF) released Oct. 5, the FTC put bloggers on notice...

….the finance sector is worse than parasitic. In the title of his recent book, The Predator State, James Galbraith aptly names the problem. The financial sector functions as the sharp canines that the predator state uses to rend the nation. In addition to siphoning off capital for its own benefit, the finance sector misallocates the remaining capital in ways that harm the real economy…:

When Illinois Senator Everett Dirksen remarked a half-century ago, “A billion here, a billion there, pretty soon it adds up to real money,” it was said with a sense of irony. I offer this clarification because a billion dollars no longer has the impact that it once had. Now with a former senator from Illinois occupying the White House, the federal government is throwing trillions of dollars around as if it were nickels. Still, for the average taxpayer, whether it is billion dollars or a trillion dollars, it’s a mind numbing amount. When the Legislature approved $12.6 billion in new...

Yesterday, the Federal Trade Commission issued an 81 page document entitled “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising” requiring bloggers who write testimonials about products to disclose gifts or payments they receive. So if a company sends you a dollar-store toy, you will be scrutinized by the government, regardless whether you were asked to post a review or not. Whether it be free review copies of books, trips to oil rigs, payments, t-shirts, whatever it is, you better disclose it, to Uncle Sam, or, as the Washington Post reports, you’ll be fined up to $11,000 in fines...

The Federal Trade Commission will try to regulate blogging for the first time, requiring writers on the Web to clearly disclose any freebies or payments they get from companies for reviewing their products. The FTC said Monday its commissioners voted 4-0 to approve the final Web guidelines, which had been expected. Violating the rules, which take effect Dec. 1, could bring fines up to $11,000 per violation.

Let the Progressive Democrats dream their redistributed wealth commie dreams because, sooner or later, reality always comes back to lay some serious bite marks on their asses. Democratic political committees have seen a decline in their fundraising fortunes this year, a result of complacency among their rank-and-file donors and a de facto boycott by many of their wealthiest givers, who have been put off by the party's harsh rhetoric about big business. Those currently in power in the Democratic party are from its Progressive fringe and that makes for a lot of rousing class warfare rhetoric during a campaign but...

William K. Black's Proposal for “Systemically Dangerous Institutions” /snip SDIs should: 1. Not be permitted to acquire other firms 2. Not be permitted to grow 3. Be subject to a premium federal corporate income tax rate that increases with asset size 4. Be subject to comprehensive federal and state regulation, including: a. Annual, full-scope examinations by their primary federal regulator b. Annual examination by the systemic risk regulator c. Annual tax audits by the IRS d. An annual forensic (anti-fraud) audit by a firm chosen by their primary federal regulator e. An annual audit by a firm chosen by their...

Americans who slap $1 pricetags on their used possessions at garage sales or bazaar events risk being slapped with fines of up to $15 million, thanks to a new government campaign.

TOKYO (Reuters) - Proposals by Japan's new ruling party to slash greenhouse gas emissions may trigger a shake-out in smokestack industries like paper, cement and steel, but boost firms investing in solar and other green technologies. A Democratic Party (DPJ) pledge to cut emissions by 25 percent from 1990 levels by 2020 is one of several proposals causing a stir across businesses. Another is a plan aimed at banning most temporary factory workers. Corporate executives say that could hit profits and push more investment overseas.

The first question we should be asking in the healthcare debate is: Why should anyone think that politicians would do a better job redesigning our healthcare than the free market? After all, politicians have helped create the problems (healthcare costs increasing at an unsustainable rate and a growing number of uninsured) that politicians now are in a hurry to try to fix. For example: Tax subsidies for employer-purchased insurance have encouraged the overconsumption of healthcare (because many employers have purchased insurance tantamount to prepaid healthcare), limited employees' choice of insurance plans to whatever the employer offers, and required employees to...

"Professor Lisa Jardine said that payments should be considered because a national shortage of donated eggs and sperm was driving infertile couples to seek treatment abroad, where large fees are permitted. British donors can receive only expenses, plus up to £250 for lost earnings. Any such move would have to comply with the 2004 EU Tissues and Cells Directive, which restricts the circumstances in which money can change hands for sperm and eggs. The directive requires that governments “shall endeavour to ensure voluntary and unpaid donations of tissues and cells” and states that compensation “is strictly limited to making good...

THE most ominous domes tic event of the 1970s was the collapse of self-gov ernment in New York City, which before being put into receivership by the state was liberalism's laboratory. Since then, California has been the slate on which liberalism boldly writes its recipe for decline -- high taxes, heavy regulation, subservience to public-employee unions and environmentalism that is simultaneously apocalyptic and chiliastic. Because California's calamitous present -- creative accounting as a rickety bridge to the next budget crisis -- might prefigure the nation's future, next year's gubernatorial election is portentous. An intriguing candidate is Tom Campbell. Colorful he...

PRESIDENT Obama and his allies in Congress seem to have decided that the best way to fix the private health-insurance market is to break it completely. Polls have prompted them to shift from health-care reform to "health-insurance reform." Combine this with a government-funded, -regulated and an ultimately -controlled "co-op" system, and the nation will arrive by local roads at the same destination that the public rejected via the expressway: an out-of-control health-care system dominated by federal bureaucrats and funded by increasingly high taxes. The irony is that private insurance works well where it's least regulated. To find the unaffordable disasters,...

PRESIDENT Obama and con gressional Democrats are now fixing their gun sights on health insurers, but their broader, underlying goals remain unchanged: socializing costs and extending Washington's control of the health-care sector. This takes what Obama told Joe the Plumber about "spreading the wealth" a step further. Because not only do the reforms redistribute wealth by shifting costs; they also put government in charge of spending even more of the nation's money. And they can do it via a "public option" or heavy insurance regulation and mandates. Follow along: Obama is now blasting insurers, claiming they "do nothing to improve...

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Exchange-traded funds or ETFs have become a top target in U.S. regulators' efforts to rein in excessive speculation in oil and other commodity markets, The Wall Street Journal reported on Saturday. Commodity ETFs, which came into existence in 2003, offer one of the few avenues for small investors to gain direct exposure to commodity markets. The funds pool money from investors to make one-way bets, usually on rising prices. Some say this causes excessive buying that artificially inflates prices for oil, natural gas and gold. Commodity ETFs have ballooned to hold $59.3 billion in assets as of...

A federal law banning lead and other toxic substances in products for children 12 and under has raised new concerns. Some libraries have pulled children's books that were printed before 1986 because lead was used in printer's ink before then. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says the chances of those books containing lead harmful to children is low. At least two libraries didn't want to take any chances and removed the books from their shelves. The Consumer Product Safety Commission interprets the new federal law to include books but hasn't weighed in on whether older books could cause...

Are our current health care costs unsustainable like the democrats say? I think so. Will either side come up with a solution to fix the problem? I doubt it. The democrats ask for a public, government-run insurance company to “compete with those evil private insurance companies,” and the republicans said “no, but lets compromise.” Now they are talking about non-profit co-ops to provide more insurance to people and the republicans are looking at that as a victory i’m sure.

The Commodities Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) wrapped up its hearings on whether to install position limits on futures trading this week, and like other hot topics being tossed around Capitol Hill, misinformation seems to be running rampant. One myth is that speculators only bet on prices going higher. The chart below shows both long and short futures positions for all commodities. While it's definitely not a one-to-one ratio, the chart shows that investing in futures is a two-way street, with investors lining up on both sides. Another myth is the overall size of the speculative market. According to a recent...

I can't resist. Because I see that the libtard website Firedoglake posted a hit piece on the perils of the free market, using the auction-rate securities market as a prime example, I have to respond. For one, because they're wrong, but there's nothing unusual about that. More importantly, when they're discussing the auction-rate securities market, they're kind of playing in my sandbox. And it seems like they brought a shovel, although it's not for digging sand, if you know what I mean.

ARE the "savings" promised for health-care reform wise ones? Some cost-savers just aren't worth it: Skipping a mammogram when you have a family history of breast cancer is a bad idea. Yet there are lots of bad ideas on the table in the health-reform debate. Patients are "going to have to give up paying for things that don't make them healthier," President Obama announced at his last prime-time press conference. "If there's a blue pill and a red pill, and the blue pill is half the price of the red pill and works just as well, why not pay half...

The message from Washington is clear and getting louder by the day. If you run a successful business you face excessive government regulations and higher levels of taxation for years to come. The more productive and profitable you become, the more you will be forced to pay for the privilege of operating in this country. This threat is real and it appears that many companies and business owners are taking steps to protect themselves. President Obama's anti-business and anti-competitive campaign messages made executives and business owners apprehensive even before the January 2009 presidential inauguration and the Democrats obtaining control of...

International financial services groups should be ex­cluded from the US market if they are based in countries that are havens from regulation, according to the head of a US congressional committee. Barney Frank, chairman of the House financial services committee, said he was concerned the new US push to regulate banks and brokers more rigorously could put it at a competitive disadvantage if other countries did not follow suit. As a result, he would like to ban US banks from doing business with countries not subject to similarly tough standards on everything from leverage limits and capital requirements to rules...

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner blasted top U.S. financial regulators in an expletive-laced critique last Friday as frustration grows over the Obama administration’s faltering plan to overhaul U.S. financial regulation, according to people familiar with the meeting. The proposed regulatory revamp is one of President Barack Obama’s top domestic priorities. But since it was unveiled in June, the plan has been criticized by the financial-services industry, as well as by financial regulators wary of encroachment on their turf Watch Video: http://butasforme.com/2009/08/04/geithner-goes-on-expletive-laced-tirade/

Our Democratic Party controlled government is really into multi-tasking. We have a Secretary of State who likes to create "promotional toys' like reset/overspend buttons, a President of the United States who fancies himself as a car salesman and a protector of the de-tonsiled masses, and now a Chairman of the House Banking Committee who wants the be Human Resources Director for the entire country. Barney Frank's financial services committee passed a bill that would allow government to control finances of all financial companies not just those who have received funds from the U.S. government. If that doesn't scare you, it...

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=ahZl9asR.GX8

Consumers know less about the water they pay dearly for in bottles than what they can drink almost for free from the tap because the two are regulated differently, congressional investigators and nonprofit researchers say in new reports. Both the Government Accountability Office and the Environmental Working Group, a nonprofit research and advocacy organization, recommend in reports released Wednesday that bottled water be labeled with the same level of information municipal water providers must disclose.

For those of you who have not heard, HR 2749 the Food Safety Enhancement Act of 2009, is a bill in congress that would basically eliminate Organic farming, and pretty well wipe out your back yard organic garden. For heaven’s sake, don’t even consider selling your homemade jam at a Farmers Market or the Saturday Market! Not unless you are willing to pay the 1000$ licensing fee anyway. With the stated purpose of making the Food system in the United States safer, the liberal Washington DC Government has decided in its wisdom to make the entire industry formulaic and regulated....

Americans will celebrate their freedom on Independence Day with a certain irony tomorrow. Not all Americans have the freedom to celebrate the holiday with the traditional festive bang. That's because many places ban fireworks. Although about 94 million of us live in states that allow all sorts of fireworks and firecracker use, 43 million Americans live in six states - including New York and New Jersey - where you need a permit to even light a sparkler. California bans some types of fireworks and allows cities to expand what is prohibited. Safety is supposedly the major concern of those who...

Regulation: Ignoring the first rule of holes, a bankrupt state passing out IOUs welcomes an EPA waiver allowing it to further kill its economy. Too bad the state can't stop the air pollution imported from a growing China. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Tuesday granted California its long-standing request — denied by the Bush administration — for a waiver to allow it to impose even more stringent air pollution rules than currently required by the federal government.The way is now clear for implementation of a 2002 state law requiring new cars to increase their fuel economy 40% by 2016....

Citing the cereal’s claim that incorporating Cheerios into a daily diet could lower cholesterol by up to 4% within 6 weeks, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has announced proposed regulations that would require buyers to obtain a doctor’s prescription before they would be allowed to purchase the product. “Lowering cholesterol is a medical outcome,” FDA spokesperson, Susan Cruzan pointed out. “As such, it comes under our jurisdiction. Other makers of cholesterol-lowering drugs must get FDA approval before marketing their products. To allow General Mills to skate on this would give them an unfair advantage.” Cruzan contended that “requiring consumers...

The House of Representatives will vote Friday(Today) on the so-called “American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009” -- a.k.a the “Waxman-Markey” global warming bill. But whatever you want to call this legislative atrocity, if enacted into law, it will go down in history as the death knell of the American standard of living and way of life. If you hate America, this bill is for you. After decades of fierce battling between rabid greens -- that is, left-wingers masquerading as “environmentalists” -- and the global warming skeptics, few Americans seem to have bought into the bill’s premise ­ that...

It appears that years of debate about climate change and energy may now come down to a vote on an actual bill, the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 (ACES). As I write this, the vote is scheduled for Friday. If it occurs, you will be asked to vote to implement carbon rationing in the United States.   Without regard to party or ideology, I believe that the evidence is clear that this law would be contrary to the public interest. Here is why, in a nutshell: 1.  It would be a terrible deal for American taxpayers. According to the...

Last week, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released their analysis of the Waxman-Markey climate change bill that had proponents of the bill claiming Americans could save the planet for just $175 per household. That was the figure CBO estimated cap and trade would cost households in 2020 alone.[1]Both the CBO's analysis and the subsequent legislation are troubled: The analysis grossly underestimates economic costs while the legislation will have virtually no impact on climate. Overall, there are a number of basic problems with CBO's analysis: Their allowance cost numbers do not add up; They ignore economic costs such as the decrease...

WASHINGTON – America’s third largest party urged the U.S. House Tuesday to defeat plans for a $1.9 trillion energy tax hike over eight years. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is attempting to rush H.R. 2454, the Waxman-Markey energy tax bill, to a vote this week. “With unemployment rising above and beyond what President Obama said it would be with the multi-hundred billion dollar stimulus bill, now is not the time to dismantle our economy with a multi-hundred billion dollar energy tax hike,” said William Redpath, Libertarian National Committee Chairman. “Libertarians urge House members to defeat this job-killing tax hike on Americans,”...

ABSTRACT: Democratic leaders in the House have scheduled a Friday vote on a climate change bill that would establish a complex cap-and-trade system to limit the nation's greenhouse gas emissions, a priority for President Obama. The House Rules Committee unveiled the latest version of the bill, which weighs in at 1,201 pages. It features new items such as $7.5 billion in "green bonds" for a new federal financing agency called the Clean Energy Deployment Administration, extra emission allowances for politically powerful rural electric cooperatives, greater flexibility for states that want to use free allowances for mass transit, and tweaks benefiting...

Is an imperfect climate bill (Waxman-Markey) better than no bill at all? Al Gore says yes.To bring environment supporters together, Gore will host a nationwide conference call on June 23 at 8 p.m. ET. The purpose, according to his Repower America e-mail sent to a selected audience, is “to build urgency around this bill and make sure it passes. We have to go to the grassroots – we have to continue building support in communities across the nation.”“As this climate legislation moves before the full Congress this summer, we have an opportunity unlike anything we’ve seen yet,” the e-mail concludes.Gore...

If you haven't seen this, you need to. Christopher Whalen is a principal of a firm that rates the performance of commercial banks, Institutional Risk Analytics. I have featured some of his writing before in Tickers, but this one, submitted to The Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs yesterday, takes the cake. You must read this in full but for those who are incapable of understanding it, I'll spell out details for you. Some excerpts: Simply stated, the supra-normal returns paid to the dealers in the closed OTC derivatives market are effectively a tax on other market participants,...

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will roll the dice on a top priority this week, bringing a contentious climate change bill to the floor despite strong misgivings from her rank-and-file and an outspoken chairman who remains a major impediment. The speaker filed the legislation with the Rules Committee on Monday night, her spokesman said, even though its authors, Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) and Massachusetts Rep. Ed Markey, are still working out a deal with Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson. [Snip] Peterson, who articulated the complaints of farm-state Democrats, has come to stand for many other rank-and-file...