Just as the wheels of Congress grind slowly to produce legislation, as noted above on the stalled effort to help restore the Gulf, they may also seem immovable well after Congress passes and the president signs important legislation. Take the Volcker Rule, probably the most important element of the Frank-Dodd financial reform bill passed in July 2010.
The Volcker Rule -- named after its wise advocate, former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker -- was designed to accomplish the seemingly simple goal of stopping commercial banks from making speculative bets from its own accounts, which are insured by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, and backed by taxpayer dollars.
It was such proprietary trading -- mistakenly allowed following repeal 13 years ago of the Glass-Steagall Act -- which many analysts reasonably believe led to the financial meltdown of 2007, throwing the economy into the worst recession since the Great Depression.
The Frank-Dodd reform ostensibly would resurrect the Glass-Steagall firewall, which had restricted banks that take deposits and make loans from trading in securities like investment banks, which underwrite securities juice up Wall Street's speculative trading.
Problem is, the nation's biggest banks, which became richer than ever after 1999, and their all-powerful lobbyists have aggressively opposed the Volcker Rule. And they've enlisted their lackey GOP senators and congressmen to fight their battle against this penultimate reform as federal rule-makers seek to recreate and implement it.
The battle has become epic. Until just a couple of months ago, banking lobbyists and Republican leaders had defanged the proposed regulatory statute for the new Volcker Rule with so many exemptions -- chiefly in the margins of banks' unquestioned rights to hold securities and make markets for customers -- that it seemed unlikely the government's rule-making committee could meet its July deadline for fixing the terms of the Volcker Rule. That would have delayed the issue until after the presidential election, when Republicans hope to have the votes to gut banking reform.
In a turn in behalf of public interest, the rule-making committee, backed by Senate Democratic leaders, has recently stiffened its spine. It now seems more determined to strictly interpret the basic premise that the banks should not be allowed to use money from insured deposits to augment trading in securities.
Public support for this core premise shouldn't be hard to come by. If the federal government is obligated to insure deposits when banks fail, that barrier should be upheld. Otherwise, the nation will surely have to finance banking bailouts again in the next big bust.