Finally...someone on OUR side...go, Bernie, go...break up those "too big to fail" outfits

All I can add is thank you, Bernie, I'll be calling my senators demanding passage of this bill.

Follow the link to read the bill itself.

Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) introduced new legislation on Friday that should, he claims, solve the phenomenon of massive and failing financial institutions holding the nation's economy captive.

It's all of two pages long.

The Vermont Democrat-Socialist unveiled the "Too Big to Fail, Too Big to Exist Act" -- which he billed as a succinct remedy for tackling financial risk and avoiding a repeat of the taxpayer-funded bailouts that occurred just one year ago.

The act is straightforward. It would require that 90 days after its passage, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner "submit to Congress a list of all commercial banks, investment banks, hedge funds and insurance companies that the Secretary believes are too big to fail."

Subsequently, one year after the law is enacted, the Treasury Secretary would be required to "break up entities included on the Too Big To Fail List, so that their failure would no longer cause a catastrophic effect on the United States or global economy without a taxpayer bailout."

www.huffingtonpost.com...

[edit on 7-11-2009 by apacheman]

Originally posted by apacheman
All I can add is thank you, Bernie, I'll be calling my senators demanding passage of this bill.

Follow the link to read the bill itself.

Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) introduced new legislation on Friday that should, he claims, solve the phenomenon of massive and failing financial institutions holding the nation's economy captive.

It's all of two pages long.

The Vermont Democrat-Socialist unveiled the "Too Big to Fail, Too Big to Exist Act" -- which he billed as a succinct remedy for tackling financial risk and avoiding a repeat of the taxpayer-funded bailouts that occurred just one year ago.

The act is straightforward. It would require that 90 days after its passage, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner "submit to Congress a list of all commercial banks, investment banks, hedge funds and insurance companies that the Secretary believes are too big to fail."

Subsequently, one year after the law is enacted, the Treasury Secretary would be required to "break up entities included on the Too Big To Fail List, so that their failure would no longer cause a catastrophic effect on the United States or global economy without a taxpayer bailout."

www.huffingtonpost.com...

[edit on 7-11-2009 by apacheman]

You know, that is the first time I have ever agreed with a socialist.

After the financial crisis of 1907, the Nation also demanded that the big Wall Street banks be broken up. Banking reform was the word of the day. The solution delivered to us by the banks and Congress was the Federal Reserve System, which only consolidated power in Wall Street, and it has been downhill ever since. I hope Bernie's bill fares better, but I have my doubts that it even has a chance.

reply to post by apacheman


GOOD!!!

I agree!

Go you crazy socialist you!

Be sure to call your senators first thing Monday to demand passage of this bill, with followup calls midweek.

I'd like to ask all members to try and get some action on this, and post the excuses their senators give them if they (the senators) are opposed to it.

This is too important to let it die a quiet commitee death.

In my opinion, this would be like taking the whole problem, splitting it in half, and just moving each part somewhere else...

Why don't we just put certain restrictions on them that actually prevent such catastrophe? And then ENFORCE those restrictions...

I believe fighting fire with fire, but I feel the goal is not to put them out, but just make sure they do their damn job. That includes running a successful business, and if they fail - then they fall...

It's an intriguing idea. We've already got anti-monopoly laws. Why not have some that forbid companies from growing too large? Not sure how in the heck it would be possible, but it would likely solve a lot of problems.

One of the greatest problems we face is that our corporations are too big and powerful. They tend to control politicians, ram laws through that are contrary to the good of the voters, force acceptance of harmful policies allowing pollution, wage slavery, and other problems. Putting some limitations in place would likely have some good effects.

Of course, such laws wouldn't prohibit behind-the-scenes, informal collusion between smaller corporations to get the same power, but it might make it more difficult. Also, laws prohibiting such collusion, enforced with serious penalties, might help.

I don't care that this politician is a "Socialist", whatever that's supposed to mean. Many of our government programs could be called "socialistic", but they seem to be OK, But I do think this guy's on to something here.

Go Bernie, thats it! I'm moving to Vermont... Anyway if you are too lazy to look up your congress person's contact info use the posted link and CALL/EMAIL ANNOY! It's the only way you can get your voice heard. Contact congress

Sweet. I agree that this should be passed and implemented. Corporations are too big in this country and not only will they no longer be "too big to fail", they will be too small to control Washington.

The only problem is though, I think this bill will probably never see the light of day.

I don't really see the need for this. Not all corporations are bad and corporations that are doing well shouldn't be punished for their success. What should happen rather is not the break up of these corporations rather- the government shouldn't even be bailing out these corporations in the first place. This double think makes me sick!!

Originally posted by FritosBBQTwist
In my opinion, this would be like taking the whole problem, splitting it in half, and just moving each part somewhere else...

Why don't we just put certain restrictions on them that actually prevent such catastrophe? And then ENFORCE those restrictions...

I believe fighting fire with fire, but I feel the goal is not to put them out, but just make sure they do their damn job. That includes running a successful business, and if they fail - then they fall...

restrictions don't work! After the Great depression Congress passed bill after bill to prevent another great depression and what happened? the banks started lobbying congress to remove the regulations.

Guess what happened. thats right the savings and loan crisis. so congress put some of the restrictions back. the banks lobbied to have them removed again on the promise they would police themselves. what happened? bank after bank started to fail, the government bailout banks that were deemed to big to fail. sound familiar? it should because its going on right now.

if your going to put restrictions on banks and large corporations fine but they better be ones that can't be removed by congress!

This does need to be brought up. It is really strange how things have come out after 230 years. The division of the Libral and the Conservatives is also the division of what our founding fathers stood for and built. They both take just the part they want, and then add a bunch of BS on top to have Power for themselves.

Most people don't know that Corporate Charters were not allowed in our new country. At the turn of the last Century, in fifteen years time, our Republic was comprimised and as of late a death blow.

reply to post by Frankidealist35


Wouldn't apply to ALL corporations, just those "too big too fail". This has been done before, although for different reasons.

When they broke up Ma Bell, there were dire predictions about loss of phone services to rural areas, lack of compatibility, compromised national security, etc., etc.....

Sure, it won't stop things from happening again as they get various provisions peeled back by various Congresses, but it'll sure as hell slow the process down.

And for awhile, it'll even reverse the process a little and improve the economy. Breaking up monolithic corporations will open up lots of jobs and increase competition in a healthy way.

Socialism has been made into a bad word. True socialism is nothing but a collective group of people that pool their assets to help each other with needs that they all have. Communism seeks to control all aspects of everything. Nothing wrong with socialism in a limited capacity. A true socialist should be very concerned about spending public monies, so that they have the greatest positive impact of the people giving that money.

I agree with the "socialist" his bill is a very simple concept, and I'm glad to see some of our representatives doing a bit of rationale thinking. Too big to fail, means you need to go out of business. I like it.

Signed,

-A conservative

The road to hell is paved with good intentions. I want to know the definition of "break up" when being applied to these companies before I would support this.

You also need an unbiased economist panel to determine the effect this would have on the economy. The intentions are noble, but if this is what might cause the nation's economy to completely die then it wouldn't be worth it.

reply to post by apacheman


Bernie's all right. I like that guy. Great idea. They did it to the phone company, they should do it to these corrupt banks and companies.

Originally posted by FritosBBQTwist
In my opinion, this would be like taking the whole problem, splitting it in half, and just moving each part somewhere else...

Why don't we just put certain restrictions on them that actually prevent such catastrophe? And then ENFORCE those restrictions...

I believe fighting fire with fire, but I feel the goal is not to put them out, but just make sure they do their damn job. That includes running a successful business, and if they fail - then they fall...

My reason I support this is it is a simple message. If the government believes a company is "too big to fail" and must bailout those companies, then it is in the interest of all Americans to never have companies get so big that they threaten the entire economic well being of a nation.

I agree with the sentiment, but I actually think it would be a better, faster, cheaper fix to simply let them fail. Remove all ties and let them burn. We have nice cheap internet these days because the failed models failed and we had no government guarantees. Investors bought the resulting infrastructure for pennies on the dollar.

Often times short term failures lead to long term gains, but America has wanted to ignore long term gain in lieu of short term politics for a while now.

I also think it's a great idea to remove all forms of government loan backing. It just might cause people to be a bit more cautious, let alone the companies.

As a matter of public policy, it might be a good idea to have some sort of reasonable usury laws. It's dangerous to any nation or group of people to have the very folks who make money off the trading of money, be this powerful.

I'm not a big fan of Bernie Sanders or socialists in general, but on the face of it, I agree 100% with this idea. It seems to me that if a company is 'too big to fail', it is both an economic threat to the nation, but also is likely operating essentially as a monopoly. So yeah, unless there's some nasty repercussion of this, either in its own merits or due to some problematic aspect of the bill itself, I'm all for it. Break them up.

Teddy Roosevelt, a republican, a conservative in the historic sense was a trust buster. Bernie Sanders is great we need more like him! Corporations and wealthy special interests have sadly, nearly destroyed the USA.