Jon Huntsman makes no one happy...

In an op-ed piece in The Wall Street Journal, former Utah Governor, former US Ambassador to China, and current Republican Presidential Candidate Jon Huntsman complains about Too Big To Fail and the Dodd-Frank Act. However, he says the following, which will not be well received on the Right:

"Congress should explore reforms now being considered by the U.K. to make the unwinding of its biggest banks less risky for the broader economy. It could impose a fee on banks whose size exceeds a certain percentage of the GDP to cover the cost they would impose on taxpayers in a bailout, thus eliminating the implicit subsidy of their too-big-to-fail status. Congress could also implement tax reform that eliminates the deduction for interest payments that gives a preference to debt over equity, thus ending subsidies for excess leverage."

Hmm, a model based on one from a European country? Strike 1 says the Republican Party that prefers fake "American exceptionalism" over logic and reason any day of the week (and twice on Sunday). Impose a fee on banks that are too big? This is Socialism (as they see it) by having the government try to limit the size of a business; strike 2! Tax reform that eliminates the deduction for interest payments? Hey, that's a corporate tax increase! Strike 3!

Then he says the following:

"Once too-big-to-fail is fixed, we could then more easily repeal the law's unguided regulatory missiles, such as the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. American banks provide advice and access to capital to the entrepreneurs and small business owners who have always been our economic center of gravity. We need a banking sector that is able to serve that critical role again. Otherwise the sector's endgame will be continental Europe—an unsustainable socialist state and the death of entrepreneurship."

This very obviously misses the point of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, whose job is akin to the Better Business Bureau and protects consumers from those de-regulated companies that are allowed to profit from taking advantage of consumers since there is no regulation to prevent them from acting unethically. So the Democrats that liked you (like the guy that appointed you Ambassador to China) won't like this op-ed piece either.

You're usually a reasonable sounding guy Jon but the policy analyst that wrote this piece for you (FYI, politicians don't write op-eds for themselves. Someone writes it for them.) clearly doesn't share your sense of reason.

In case you missed it the first eight times, she said "We need a cop on the beat"

Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank writes about Elizabeth Warren appearing before a House committee yesterday stressing the importance of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. He seemed to be particularly amused by her use of the 'cop on the beat' metaphor:

"If [Warren is] the cop, then banks are the robbers, and members of the Republican majority on the committee sounded like lawyers for the accused."

In case you were wondering, I'm guessing this was planned well in advance since the CFPB's web site has an image of a police shield with the letters 'CFPB' inscribed in bold block letters.