A Victory for Main Street

Dan Petegorsky

The major Financial Reform legislation has just cleared a final cloture vote in the Senate, and represents a real victory for Main Street over Wall Street (tip of the hat to Jeff Merkley, who’s been a true champion in working to strengthen the bill). It’s a critical first step in reining in the casino economy that enriched speculators while spreading economic ruin across the entire country.

Just this morning we’ve got further evidence of how that ruin continues, and of the people and dynamics that perpetuate it. While new figures reveal that foreclosures will reach even higher, Oregon has now joined in a lawsuit against Countrywide for defrauding the Public Employee Retirement Fund to the tune of $29 million.

JP Morgan Chase, which sold the bogus securities backed by Countrywide’s fraudulent mortgages, is one of the parties named in the lawsuit. Alongside the new regulations, these pesky lawsuits are no doubt part of what’s left CEO Jamie Dimon feeling like “being the chief is less fun these days.”

Less fun. There we have it. Millions of jobs and lives destroyed, record foreclosures, an entire economy in tatters – and Jamie Dimon’s having less fun. It’s like BP’s Tony Hayward saying “I would like my life back.”

Siphoning money from working and middle class people to create a class of entitled super-rich who live like royalty should be like passing a stone, not “fun.” The reforms that will be voted into place this afternoon are just the beginning.

By Dan Petegorsky July 15, 2010