Word: reformism
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Even if Dodd had agreed to water down reform enough to cut a deal with Corker, that wouldn't have guaranteed success; it was not clear if any other Republicans would have supported it, if Democrats on his committee would have agreed to pass it, if it could have survived the full Senate, if the Senate would have been able to work out its differences with the House in a conference, if the Senate and House would have been able to pass the resulting conference bill, or if Obama - whose aides have suggested they'd much prefer no bill...
...before scuttling the talks with tea-party rhetoric about grannycide. But Dodd is retiring after 36 years in the Senate, and he was eager to cut a deal for the sake of his legacy. He knew he needed GOP votes, and he figured that after a catastrophic meltdown, financial reform would be less polarizing than health care. And Corker did seem to be negotiating in good faith, even if GOP leaders were clearly eager to pull the football away before Charlie Brown could kick. (See 25 people to blame for the financial crisis...
...election year by cobbling together 59 Democrats and a Republican; it's probably hopeless, and certainly hopeless without cutting unsavory deals like the toxic Cornhusker Kickback on health care. But weakening the bill won't get him to 60 either; it will just alienate Democrats committed to reform in the House as well as the Senate, while most Republicans will still find some reason to oppose...
...independent consumer agency isn't the most vital provision for preventing another meltdown, but it's the most vital provision for persuading ordinary families that reform is about them. And along with significantly less vital provisions that would help shareholders rein in executive pay, it's the starkest way to make the case that opposing reform means doing the bidding of Wall Street. Sure, disputes over systemic risk, clearinghouses for derivatives, resolution authority for failing firms and proprietary trading are all important, but they're not going to move the masses. (See the top 10 financial-crisis buzzwords...
...about naked credit default swaps? - that reaching consensus by August would be challenging even if everyone wanted it. And it's not clear that anyone is desperate to have it; there probably won't be another meltdown this year, and Democratic leaders may be content to let Republicans block reform so they can blast them as Wall Street shills in November. But it's at least possible that Republicans will decide that they want to keep the focus on health care, that giving Democrats a populist issue could transform the landscape before the midterms, that letting financial reform pass would...