Category: Legislation

More Ass Covering by the Fed

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As I have noted before, now that Congress is looking at having an agency dedicated to protecting consumers from the worst excesses of the banking industry, and the Federal Reserve Feels believes that this role belongs to it.

Of course, the history of the Fed over the past 40+ years is that they believe in dismantling consumer protections, so their record is less than stellar.

In response to numerous proposals which would make consumer protection more formal in financial markets, which they see as a reduction in their bailiwick, they have continued to make “a day lat and a dollar short” regulations in an an attempt to convince Congress that they do not need to assign this task to some other agency.

Case in point, is how, after decades of skyrocketing fees and increasingly punitive “overdraft protection” schemes, Bernanke and his merry band have decided to clamp down on overdraft fees:

The Federal Reserve is likely to soon pass new rules making it harder for banks to hit customers with fees for overdrawing their accounts, a top official told a Senate subcommittee Wednesday.

Note that it appears that these rules will require that banks have customers positively affirm their desire to opt in to overdraft protection.

It’s amazing what the prospect of some regulatory competition will do to a bureaucracy.

Earlier posts on the subject here.

Barack and Rahm Need to Get Over Themselves

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So, as a result of putting Republicans (Olympia Snow) and insurance whore DINOs in the driver’s seat in the Senate, the White House is getting flack from Gerry McEntee, the president of AFSME, and the Obama and His Stupid Minions™ are describing this behavior as, “gratuitous slaps.”

Tough noogies, kids. The Obama administration has been running the process on healthcare reform, and pretty much everything else as a war on the “Democratic Wing of the Democratic Party”, and somehow they are surprised when a Union President, would oppose what is literally a tax on his members just because Obama is desperate to put his name on something … anything … that he can call health care reform.

We need more of what Mr. McEntee is doing, not less.

H/t AMERICAblog.

I’m Agreeing with Richard Shelby?

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It’s true. As a part of updating financial regulations, Senator Shelby is trying to change the way in which the presidents of the Federal Reserve district banks are selected, by removing the ability of the lending institutions subject to that Fed bank to nominate their new president, he correctly notes that, “Any institution that is going to be involved in any way picking their regulator is not good policy.”

As to the current governance structure:

Each of the 12 Fed district banks has a nine-member board that includes three bankers, three non-bankers chosen by banks and three non-banker directors picked by the Fed’s Senate- confirmed governors in Washington. The directors nominate a president who is approved by the Board of Governors. The presidents vote on interest-rate decisions on a rotating basis, with New York having a permanent vote.

The idea that banks can hand pick one of their primary regulators has always been a bad idea, so I would go further, and remove banks from selecting the directors of the regional banks too.

While we are at it, how about shortening the terms of members. It’s currently 14 years, and it’s too long, and makes the board far to unresponsive and insular.

Additionally, one of the controls on the behavior of the Fed is meaningful criticism of its actions in academic economic publications, but the central bank has control over most of the academic economic publications, because so many of the editors out there are also on the Federal Reserve payroll, so a legal injunction prohibiting anyone working for the fed from acting as an editor of an economics journal would be a good thing.

Damn.

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So, the House of Representatives by a vote of 307-114 has passed an amendment to the Freedom of Information Act which exempts torture, because, I guess, everyone in Washington wants them covered up, because with knowledge is the possibility of accountability, and accountability is an anathema to the Beltway Boyz.

What is most repulsive is that this is designed just to cover up Bushie malfeasance:

To follow up on my earlier post about Rep. Louis Slaughter (D-N.Y.) and her speech on her colleagues’ move to amend the Freedom of Information Act to prevent the release of photographs depicting abuse of detainees in U.S. custody, it’s worth looking at the conference report on the bill. The bill is called the “Protected National Security Documents Act of 2009,” but refers not to any “documents” per se, but only to any “photograph” taken between Sept. 11, 2001 and Jan. 22, 2009, that “relates to the treatment of individuals engaged, captured, or detained after September 11, 2001, by the Armed Forces of the United States in operations outside of the United States.”

(emphasis mine)

Big surprise, the guy supporting this the strongest is Joe Lieberman.

When Policy Creates Stupidity

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David Stevens, HUD’s Assistant Secretary of Housing and Federal Housing Commissioner, basically the head of the Federal Housing Administration, has drawn a line in the sand against legislation increasing the minimum downpayment for an FHA loan from 3.5% to 5%.

This is the same FHA, that has had its reserves sucked dry by increasing defaults on its mortgage (here and here), and now they are fighting against making their loans less likely to default.

The reason given? That, “limiting the pool of eligible home buyers could dampen a fragile housing recovery.”

This is an extension of two largely bipartisan policies:

  • The federal government has been pushing home-ownership aggressively for decades.
  • A desperate attempt to re-inflate the housing bubble.

Both policies have proven disastrous, but decisions are still being made on this basis.

It should be noted that this is the same FHA was spitting in the face of sanity for some time by allowing “seller funded downpayment assistance loans”, where the seller raised the price of the home in order to lend the buyer the money for the downpayment (!). It was called the Down-payment Assistance Program (DAP).

This procedure is one of the reasons that they are in a pickle now, because it made it too easy for people who could not afford house payments to buy a house.

Thankfully, Congress made this illegal, and they are now looking at a further tightening of lending standards, but just as in the case the DAP, they are fighting the change tooth and nail.

Alan Grayson Leans on Reid

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I’m really starting to like this guy.*

He’s just delivered a petition with over 90K signatures to Harry Reid telling him to do his f$#@ing job and lead:

I’m told Dem Rep. Grayson will hold a press conference this afternoon in D.C. to unveil a petition to Reid bearing more than 90,000 signatures, collected by the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, insisting that “any Democratic senators who support a Republican attempt to block a vote on health care reform should be stripped of their leadership titles.”

While it is clear that Harry Reid could not do this on his own, he would need backing from other people in the senate leadership, as well as the White House, if he can’t keep Democrats from filibustering healthcare reform, why should we pull the lever for Democrats?

*In a 110% purely heterosexual kind of way, of course, as the General would say.

Baucus Piece of Sh%$ Healthcare Proposal Passes Finance Committee

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The vote was 14-9, with President Olympia Snowe voting with Democrats, but she said very clearly that she is only voting this way today.

You know if a couple of Dems had voted against the bill, like Rockefeller, who has been leading the charge for a real public option, and Wyden, who got screwed by Baucus, the measure would still have passed by 12-11, and a shot would have been fired across the bow of morons like Baucus and the Nelson twins.

Of course, now the press is wringing its hands at the likelihood that Snowe may not get Huchison’s position as ranking member of the Commerce Committee, when Kay Baily Hutichison leaves to run for governor against Rick “Goodhair” Perry….My heart bleeds. It’s clear that she has no interest in voting for real healthcare reform.

In the least surprising news of the day, it turns that the insurance industry’s biggest bitch in Congress, Senator Joe Lieberman, is taking the insurance companies’ line, and supporting the status quote.

F136 Alternate JSF Engine Update

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So, the House-Senate Conference Committee agreed to fund the F136 alternate engine for the JSF, despite a qualified veto threat from the White House.

By qualified, I mean that “sources in the WH” have said that they would “recommend a veto,” if the engine were funded, which is quite different from the flat out statement that Obama would veto anything with the F-22 white elephant Raptor.

While the weak veto threat is one of the reasons that supporters of the alternate engine have gained momentum, there is also the fact that Pratt & Whitney is doing back-flips on cost and schedule in order to try to kill the RR/GE F136 engine, which reinforces the idea that they see a real threat their profit model for the F135 engine.

Additionally, the idea that the program managers can squeeze P&W just as hard if there is no competitor out in the wings is plainly ludicrous, and the F100/F110 “engine war” of the 1980s clearly shows that.

The reason that the DoD is fighting the alternate engine at this point, is because they really want the JSF, and even a small amount of money, even if it pays ten fold dividends further out, may push the JSF further down the delay/cost escalation/procurement cuts cycle.

Ashton Carter* pretty much says that flat out when he says that, “The crux of the analysis is that the additional upfront costs of a second engine are very clear and very real and the possible savings associated with a hypothesized competition in the future are much harder to estimate.”

That being said, the development of the F-136 is not going perfectly. The manufacturers just had to halt testing following the discovery of damage to the turbine, described as “nicks and dings”.

30 Pro-Rape Republican Senators

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Senator Al Franken (damn, that sounds good) just passed a motion through the Senate banning federal funds to defense contractors who use mandatory arbitration to keep sexual assault victims out of court.

Good for him, and bad for the 30 Senators, all Republicans, who voted against it, Senators Alexander (R-TN), Barrasso (R-WY), Bond (R-MO), Brownback (R-KS), Bunning (R-KY), Burr (R-NC), Chambliss (R-GA), Coburn (R-OK), Cochran (R-MS), Corker (R-TN), Cornyn (R-TX), Crapo (R-ID), DeMint (R-SC), Ensign (R-NV), Enzi (R-WY), Graham (R-SC), Gregg (R-NH), Inhofe (R-OK), Isakson (R-GA), Johanns (R-NE), Kyl (R-AZ), McCain (R-AZ), McConnell (R-KY), Risch (R-ID), Roberts (R-KS), Sessions (R-AL), Shelby (R-AL), Thune (R-SD), Vitter (R-LA), and Wicker (R-MS) .

His statement is below.

Franken’s Proposal To Guarantee Sexual Assault Victims Their Day In Court

By 68 – 30, Amendment Offered in Honor of former KBR employee Jamie Leigh Jones Passes the Senate

Washington, D.C. [Oct 6, 2009] – Today, the amendment offered by U.S. Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.) to stop funding defense contractors who deny assault victims their day in court passed the United States Senate by a vote of 68 – 30

Last Thursday, Sen. Franken introduced an amendment (S.2588) to the FY2010 Defense Appropriations Bill that would restrict funding to defense contractors who commit employees to mandatory binding arbitration in the case of sexual assault. The legislation, endorsed by 61 women’s, labor and public interest groups, was inspired by the story of Jamie Leigh Jones, who watched the vote from the Senate gallery today.

Jones was a 19-yr-old employee of defense contractor KBR (formerly a Halliburton subsidiary) stationed in Iraq who was gang raped by her co-workers and imprisoned in a shipping container when she tried to report the crime. Her father and U.S. Rep. Ted Poe (R-Tex.), worked together to secure her safe return to the United States, but once she was home, she learned a fine-print clause in her KBR contract banned her from taking her case to court, instead forcing her into an “arbitration” process that would be run by KBR itself. Just today, Halliburton filed a petition for a rehearing en banc in the 5th Circuit Court, which means that Jamie’s fight is far from over.

“I’m proud of what we accomplished today,” said Sen. Franken. “Victims of sexual assault deserve their day in court and no corporation should be able to deny them that right. Jamie’s courage in telling her story will help women all over this country and I’m honored to have been a part of that.”

“I am highly honored that Senator Franken and his wife have created this amendment to ensure that others do not have to endure the suffering that I have,” said Jones. “This amendment makes all the hard times that I have gone through, when going public with such a personal tragedy, worth every tear shed from telling and retelling my horrific experience. I know this amendment will save so many in the future.”

Specifically, Sen. Franken’s amendment:

  • Does not require contractors to change or modify existing employment contracts. It only bars funds to contractors who continue to use these mandatory arbitration clauses in their employment contracts.
  • Narrowly targets the most egregious violations and applies to defense contracts, many of which are administered abroad, where women are the most vulnerable and least likely to have support resources. The amendment will apply to many contractors that have already demonstrated their incompetence in efficiently carrying out defense contracts, and have further demonstrated their unwillingness and their inability to protect women from sexual assault.
  • Applies to claims arising out of sexual assault, like assault & battery (including rape), intentional infliction of emotional distress, and negligent hiring, retention, and supervision, as well as Title VII civil rights claims, which were specifically designed to protect vulnerable groups in the workplace.

Leading Minnesota and national organizations who have endorsed Sen. Franken’s amendment include the Minnesota Women Lawyers, the Minnesota Coalition Against Sexual Assault, the Sexual Violence Center, Minnesota NOW, Advocates for Human Rights, the National Alliance to End Sexual Violence, the National Women’s Law Center, the National Partnership for Women and Families, the American Association of University Women, the National Council of La Raza, the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, and the Consumer Federation of America. A full list of the 61 endorsing organizations is attached.

“Sexual violence is about a person trying to exercise power and control over another person through unwanted sexual contact and violence,” said Pam Zeller, Executive Director of the Sexual Violence Center. “In arbitration the intent is to arrive at an agreement. This agreement does not have to be equitable in order to be resolved. It is also not intended to resolve a criminal matter. Sexual harassment and sexual violence inherently have an imbalance of power. Submitting a victim of sexual harassment, or sexual assault, to a process of arbitration is a revictimization of the victim, and minimizes the seriousness of the crime of sexual assault. The proposed amendment by Senator Franken will protect victims of sexual harassment and sexual violence from being revictimized through the arbitration process.”

“This amendment reflects a critically important step in safeguarding the rights of those who have experienced discrimination in the form of sexual violence, harassment, and stalking,” said Donna Dunn, Executive Director of the Minnesota Coalition Against Sexual Assault. “We know that justice for victims of violence often seems elusive. It is very important that each person have the right to assess and choose the options that they believe best fit their needs. This amendment is a giant step in that direction.”

“No survivor of sexual assault should be denied the ability to seek justice,” said Terri Poore, Policy Chair of the National Alliance to End Sexual Violence. “Asking a victim to enter into arbitration with someone who raped her or a company that wouldn’t protect her is outrageous and sends a clear message that such violence is simply not taken seriously.”

Minnesota Organizations Endorsing the Franken Amendment (SA 2588)

–snip–

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And People Pile on Berlusconi

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With Members of the European Parliament calling for sanctions against Italy over media consolidation in Italy:

Mr Berlusconi owns three commercial broadcasters, has indirect control over three public channels and owns a series of magazines, newspapers and radio stations as well as the country’s largest publishing house. His advertising firm controls much of the advertising sales in Italy, allowing his reach to extend to media beyond his direct control.

The MEPs say this has created a climate of media intimidation where journalists are fired for stepping out of line while others self-censor to hold onto their jobs. Key posts in the media are based on an individual being sufficiently deferential to the current administration, critics allege.

It would be nice if some action comes from this.

As bad as the MSM is in the United States, the idea of a political candidate controlling all the TV and cable outlets in a country is a scary thing.

The vote, which passed 268 – 284, is merely to start an inquiry, but it’s a good thing.

I think that what is going on with Berlusconi here is very similar to what was done with Pablo Escobar: You peel away at layers of protection, and eventually, pretty much all at once, the house of cards collapses, and you take the crook down.

When I Agree with Mitch McConnell…….

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I know that something is wrong, and in this case it is how accurately the Senate minority leader nails the attitude of Barack Obama and His Stupid Minions™: “

Senator McConnell dismissed the President’s substantive involvement in the debate, dryly noting the president “would sign anything the Congress sent him, provided it had ‘Health Care Reform’ written at the top of the page.

It’s not just McConnel who is saying this. We also have Robert Reich, who has always been an extremely big booster of the Obama campaign and later the Obama Administration, so when he says this:

Big Pharma and big insurance hate the public insurance option even more than they hate big Medicare discounts. And although the President has sounded as if he would welcome it, political operatives in the White House have quietly reassured the industries that it won’t be included in the final bill. At most, the bill would allow the formation of non-profit ‘cooperatives’ that wouldn’t have the scale or authority to squeeze the profits of private industry, or a ‘trigger’ that would allow states to form public insurance options eventually if certain goals for cost savings and coverage weren’t met.

Which is a clear statement against his own political interest.

He cannot bring himself to voice it explicitly, is that Barack Obama and his people do not care about healthcare reform, but that they are looking for phony reform for 2012.

The results of White House “Axis of Weasel” on this is plain to see, with , as Rockefeller’s public option amendment being voted down, as well as Schumer’s weaker tea public option.

It gets worse, of course, with Baucus proposing that nationwide standards on insurance be written by the insurance industry in his bill.

He is suggesting that the National Assn. of Insurance Commissioners write binding regulations on insurance company behavior, it has issued advisory regulations for some years, with , “States would be permitted to deviate from the standards only by appealing to the Department of Health and Human Services.”

What’s more because the NAIC is a private organization, there would be no requirement for public meetings or public access to records.

It’s mice to know that there are a few bright spots, but, as with the case of Sen. Byron Dorgan (!)

offering an amendment allowing for drug reimportation, but you know that Rahmbo , with the President’s full approval, will go all out to kill this, because the White House has already cut a deal with health insurers and pharma to boost their already obscene profits by requiring people to buy health insurance.

Adventures in Ass Covering

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It looks like any number of financial institutions are realizing that Congress is going to do them like a College Republican does a drunk sorority girl if they don’t get their act together, so they are now taking actions that they should have taken years ago. (See Barn door, cows missing)

First, the Federal Reserve has finally concluded that it should regulate some more of the non-bank lenders out there:

Tuesday that it will extend its regulatory umbrella to cover a group of lenders that includes several major originators of subprime loans, policing whether they follow federal laws that protect consumers of mortgages, credit cards and other financial products.

Federal banking regulators already oversee companies that own banks, known as holding companies, along with the banks themselves. Under the new policy, the Fed will extend the same oversight to other businesses owned by those holding companies, such as units that make home-equity loans.

The policy places subprime lenders such as CitiFinancial, an arm of Citigroup, and Wells Fargo Financial, an arm of Wells Fargo, under Fed oversight for the first time. The same laws protect all borrowers, but until now, no federal agency watched to make sure non-bank subsidiaries followed the law.

And we also have the FED suddenly requiring the financial institutions submit their pay policies to them for review.

What is going on here is that there is significant push-back in Congress against the Obama proposal that the Federal Reserve be the primary systemic risk regulator, and the desire of the Fed to be the “financial consumer protection agency”, as Bernanke is aggressive lobbying for this role shows.

When this is juxtaposed with increasing support in Congress for the Paul/Grayson proposal to audit the central bank, and we are having a gallows conversion, where they attempt to show that they are really concerned about regulation and protecting ordinary people.

Hopefully, this won’t work, and we will see a Federal Reserve with a smaller, and not a larger, role than it has today.

I think that the only two people who want the Fed’s role to expand are current chairman Ben Bernanke, and White House Economic Advisor Lawrence Summers, who is hoping to be Fed chair one day.

We are also seeing the same things with banks and overdraft fees, where proposals in Congress to regulate fees, as well as “automatic overdraft protection” and check clearing orders, are creating an orgy of heretofore non-existent concern for consumer among the big banks, with Bank of America, Wells Fargo, and J.P. Morgan Chase announcing that they will be rolling back their fees.

There is no big surprise here, the banks know that if they can always raise fees again.

The argument is the same: “We’ll be good, there is no need for legislative restrictions.”

What goes unspoken is the idea that once people are looking the other way, the rates will go back up again.

It’s the same thing with the Conference Board, an organization created for, and funded by, business executives, who are now saying that they will be issuing a report suggesting fixes in how executive compensation is determined:

The report to be released today urges companies to avoid paying for personal travel, hefty severance packages or above-market returns on deferred compensation. The recommendations were endorsed by the California State Teachers’ Retirement System, AT&T Inc. and others.

“In order to restore trust in the ability of boards of directors to oversee executive compensation, immediate and credible action must be taken,” the report from the New York research group said.

This is not about fixing things, this is simply an effort to create the appearance that things might fix themselves, in order to forestall any potential laws or regulations that would prevent excessive compensation from returning in the future.

I suppose that there is a silver lining to all this, which is that the people involved are clearly worried, which perhaps real changes can be initiated.

Legislation Introduced to End Antitrust Exemption for Health Insurers

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I’m not sure if this is going anywhere, but at the very least, it’s going to have to make the health and malpractice insurers split their resources.

There is no reason at all for an anti-trust exemption. In fact, much of the current problem is that there are local monopolies in insurance coverage over much of the nation.

Official Press release below:

Conyers, Johnson, DeGette Introduce Legislation to End Antitrust Exemption for Health Insurers

For Immediate Release September 17, 2009
Contact:
Jonathan Godfrey (Conyers)
Andy Phelan (Johnson)
Kristofer Eisenla (DeGette)

House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, Jr. (D-Mich.), Chairman of the Subcommittee on Courts and Competition Policy, Representative Hank Johnson (D-Ga.), and Energy and Commerce Committee Vice-Chair Diana DeGette (D-Colo.) today introduced the Health Insurance Industry Antitrust Enforcement Act, legislation to end the broad antitrust exemption enjoyed by health insurance companies.

Both the House and Senate today have introduced identical language to reduce insurance prices for consumers. This legislation would extend antitrust enforcement over health insurers and medical malpractice insurance issuers, which currently enjoy broad antitrust immunity under the McCarran-Ferguson Act. This immunity can serve as a shield for activities that might otherwise violate federal law.

“This legislation would specifically prohibit price fixing, bid rigging, and market allocation in the health insurance industry,” said Conyers. “These pernicious practices are detrimental to competition and result in higher prices for consumers. Conduct that is unlawful throughout the country should not be allowed for insurance companies under antitrust exemption. The House Judiciary Committee held extensive hearings on the effects of the insurance industry’s antitrust exemption throughout the 1980s and early 1990s. It became clear then that policyholders and the economy in general would benefit from eliminating this exemption.

“The legislation we introduced today is intended to root out unlawful activity in an industry grown complacent by decades of protection from antitrust oversight. In doing so, we aim to make health insurance more affordable to more Americans. I want to thank my friend Senator Leahy for his leadership on the bill and for working with the House on this joint introduction.”

“The average American family already pays an extra $1,100 in premiums every year for a broken system that supports 46 million uninsured Americans,” said Johnson. “The Enforcement Act is long overdue. I am concerned that the shield this industry enjoys have resulted in market consolidation and higher premiums for the people of my district. As millions of Americans continue to go uninsured, we cannot continue to support the insurance companies by providing them with legal cover for anticompetitive actions.”

“As health insurance premiums continue to go through the roof, now is the time to ensure that health insurance companies are not engaging in anti-competitive behavior that make it more difficult for Americans to get health coverage,” said DeGette. “Families across our nation are feeling the pinch in their budgets from having to keep up with rising insurance rates. This bill takes an important step towards making sure our health insurance industry is competitive and is providing consumers with affordable health insurance. Simply put, the bottom lines of the big insurance companies should not be put above the American public’s ability to gain access to health care.”

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F136 Saga Continues

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Well, the Senate Appropriations Committee cut funding for the F136 alternate engine for the JSF, though the committee chair, Daniel Inouye (D-HI) has made it clear that he wants it back when the conference report comes out.

In any case, it’s clear that the White House’s opposition to continuing work on an alternate engine is soft, as the discussions between the Pentagon and GE/Rolls on a firm fixed price for the engine, are continuing, and GE is promising a, “formal unsolicited Fixed Price offer,” in the next week or so.

I’m not sure if the DoD is seriously looking at proposals, of if they are just trying to browbeat Pratt & Whitney though.

Oopsie!

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Well, it looks like Republican Jihad against Acorn may have uninended consequences.

You see, in order to avoid an unconstitutional bill of attainder in their quest to punish Acorn for registering black people to vote being taken in by a right Gonzo videographer, the bill was drafted broadly.

“How broadly,” you ask?

The congressional legislation intended to defund ACORN, passed with broad bipartisan support, is written so broadly that it applies to “any organization” that has been charged with breaking federal or state election laws, lobbying disclosure laws, campaign finance laws or filing fraudulent paperwork with any federal or state agency. It also applies to any of the employees, contractors or other folks affiliated with a group charged with any of those things.

In other words, the bill could plausibly defund the entire military-industrial complex. Whoops.

Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) picked up on the legislative overreach and asked the Project on Government Oversight (POGO) to sift through its database to find which contractors might be caught in the ACORN net.

Lockheed Martin and Northrop Gumman both popped up quickly, with 20 fraud cases between them, and the longer list is a Who’s Who of weapons manufacturers and defense contractors.

Needless to say, I don’t expect anyone to enforce it against anyone but Acorn, but this does sound a bit unfortunate.

Barney Frank Can Go Cheney Himself

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Generally, I like the guy, but this is crap.

In addition to excising the requirement that banks offer “plain vanilla” mortgages and credit cards, you know, products which the consumer can actually understand enough to comparison shop for, the bill removes, “securities, commodities, investment and general insurance products; accountants and tax preparers; real estate brokers and agents; lawyers; auto dealers; communications providers; and providers of retirement and pension plans,” from the scope of the proposed consumer protection agency.

Great googly moogly! When you look at industries that confuse and abuse consumers as their primary means of profit, you have most of them in between the quotation marks.

And if you want a couple more, how about,”retailers who have credit or layaway plans and auto dealers who offer loans to buy vehicles,” because used car dealers and “Rent-A-Center” have done so well in doing right by the consumer.

Unsurprisingly, the poster child for regulatory capture, Timothy “Eddie Haskell” Geithner, expressed support for weakening the bill.

Yes, I know sausage making, but it’s damn depressing.

House Moving on LGBT Job Protection Bill

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The House Labor Committee is looking at a bill which would add sexual orientation and gender identity to protected classes under the civil rights laws.

About damn time. It passed in the house in 2007, but wilted under a Bush veto threat.

The cynic in me wonders how Obama’s people are going to try to knife it this time around, because they have gone out of their way to knife the LGBT community on almost every other level, because they found morality inconvenient in their quest for bipartisanship.

FCC Head Calls for Net Neutrality

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FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski has now explicitly called for net neutrality, known as the so-called “5th principle” of the Internet, and added a 6th principle, “that providers of broadband Internet access must be transparent about their network management practices,”* and so will be putting a notice of proposed

An interesting comment here is that the American Cable Association is saying that this should be extended to content. They specifically cite ESPN360’s policy of tying the service to ISPs, rather than individual subscribers, and using the rest of channels (ESPN, ESPN 2, etc) on cable (and fiber) to extract a per broadband subscriber fee.

I think that this is a perfectly valid point, and requiring the explicit unbundling of the Internet from the cable channels is, “at the expense of consumers on the one hand and other Web-based services and applications that might seek to compete against them.”

Not surprisingly, AT&T says that net neutrality and 4 (6, sir) 6 principles† should not be applied to wireless providers, but their argument is far weaker than for the cable/fiber optic providers, because the FCC already has extensive rights to regulate radio broadcasts and what are appropriate use of the public spectrum.

The Republicans are against net neutrality too, because they want to continue the policies that left the US in 20th place in broadband penetration, behind South Korea, Singapore, Netherlands, Denmark, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Israel, Switzerland, Canada, Norway, Australia, Finland, France, United Kingdom, United Arab Emirates, Japan, Sweden, Estonia, and Belgium, and that’s by the bastardized standard of broadband that the FCC and the incumbents want to use to define “success.”

It appears that the ‘Phants are afraid that this could prevent them from getting campaign donations from the Telecommunications industry, “These new regulatory mandates and restrictions could stifle investment incentives.”

In any case, Nancy Pelosi appears to be 4 square in favor of the change, which means that nothing is going to happen in Congress to stop this, and even the possibility that the FCC’s rule making might actually become law.

*The 4 internet freedoms are, the ability to access content, run any non-network harming application applications, to attach devices to the network, and the freedom to allow competition through reacquiring that vendors provide complete service plan information.

†And Saint Attila raised the hand grenade up on high, saying, “O Lord, bless this Thy hand grenade that with it Thou mayest blow Thine enemies to tiny bits, in Thy mercy.” And the Lord did grin and the people did feast upon the lambs and sloths and carp and anchovies and orangutans and breakfast cereals, and fruit bats and large chu… [At this point, the friar is urged by Brother Maynard to “skip a bit, brother”]… And the Lord spake, saying, “First shalt thou take out the Holy Pin, then shalt thou count to three, no more, no less. Three shall be the number thou shalt count, and the number of the counting shall be three. Four shalt thou not count, neither count thou two, excepting that thou then proceedest on to three. Five is right out. Once the number three, being the third number, be reached, then lobbest thou thy Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch towards thy foe, who being naughty in my sight, shall snuff it.” Amen.‡

‡Yeah, like I’m going to ignore such a classic opportunity to invoke Monty Python.