What Does Scott Brown of Massachusetts Stand For? He is a George W. Bush Republican
Just like George Bush, he claims to be a compassionate centrist but is in fact a ferociously partisan Republican. "I have a history of working as an independent thinker and voter having over 6,000 votes and working across Party lines ..." he told WGBH's Emily Rooney in 2009 . Rooney swallowed the claim in the interview, but the Coakley campaign checked the facts and found that Brown has voted with the Republican leadership 96 percent of the time. Last week, true to form, he announced that if elected he will be the "41st Senator".If no one else likes Brown or his promise to return us to the good old days of Bush and Cheney, it probably does not matter to Brown. His ego is what leads him, he likes himself so much he posed nude for Cosmopolitan, Senator Is the Centerfold
Scott Brown Receives Special Deal In Financial Reform Bill, But Still May Vote Against It
As the conference committee reconciling the House and Senate versions of financial regulatory reform went through its marathon 20 hour negotiating session on Thursday night, an exception to the Volcker rule — which prevents banks from trading for their own benefit with federally insured dollars — was added at the behest of Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA). The exception, which was pushed by large Massachusetts-based financial firms State Street Corp. and Mass Mutual, allows banks to invest up to three percent of their capital in risky hedge funds and private equity firms and to continue managing those funds.
These exemptions could undermine the effectiveness of the rule, as State Street is a great example of a financial firm that specialized in relatively benign financial practices, but then became systemically important by building up a huge amount of credit risk and engaging in risky trading. Ultimately, it needed to be rescued by federal intervention.
Of course, when he was first elected, Brown said that there would be “no more closed-door meetings or back-room deals by an out-of-touch party leadership.” And now, Brown isn’t even certain that he will vote for the reform bill because of a tiny bank tax levied to cover the cost of the law’s implementation:
On Friday, Brown questioned a provision added to the bill late in negotiations that would charge large banks and hedge funds a fee to generate as much as $19 billion to help cover the cost of the bill. “My fear is that these costs would be passed onto consumers in the form of higher bank, ATM and credit card fees and put a strain on lending at the worst possible time for our economy,” he said in a press release. “I’ve said repeatedly that I cannot support any bill that raises taxes.”
First, it’s worth putting this bank levy in perspective. As Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, pointed out, “the fee is approximately equal to 0.01 percent of projected GDP over the next decade. If it is fully passed on by financial institutions to customers will cost people an average of $6 a year.”
But more importantly, Brown’s deal strikes at the very heart of the Volcker rule. As former Federal Reserve Chairman and Obama administration adviser Paul Volcker said, “allowing a bank to invest in a speculative fund goes against the very intent of the bill as we seek to define those activities that are worthy of government protection.”
Brown could have stepped up and decided to put the American public first, but like a petulant child refused. Brown, relishing his role as the deciding vote, decided to look out for the sleaze bags on Wall St.
