Reply #1

C'mon, sing it with me!

Ding dong, democracy's dead; behind closed doors, corruption spreads. Ding, dong, the Stock Act's guts were shred! Hi ho's and freedom's foes, spread them bribes, high and low; insider trading is now 'GO'!

It's gone where the plutos go, oh ho, oh ho ho ho, below (our Congress works for them) not for us so sing it: Ding, dong, democracy's dead; behind closed doors, corruption spreads! Ding, dong, democracy is dead!

The Senate couldn't get even 60 of the 97 who had ALREADY voted for the anti corruption provisions in the Senate bill to vote to DO THEIR JOB, of reconciling the House and Senate versions of a bill!!! Not after donors and Wall Street applied pressure. We're the ones last in line, who would go to jail for the corruption the gutted Stock Act now legalizes, untraceably.

Any one who thinks some Republicans or some Democrats are the problem has not looked at Congress's incentives, nor history: It would take overwhelming voter pressure on everyone in Congress, to compete with their sense of self preservation, their campaign donors, their consultant contacts, and their chances of lucrative futures, after serving their supposed constituents. No surprise that Senator Snowe is quitting, nor that she says the only thing that will clean up DC corruption is transparency, which she assumes won't happen soon.

Anything that threatens the corrupting influence of donors and Wall Street is done behind closed doors (the GOP House gutted their version of the Stock Act behind closed doors, with no debate nor amendments allowed). The Senate abandoned their own legislation, once their paymasters leaned on them, instead 'concurring' with the gutted House version of the Stock Act. Our democracy is based on public debate and compromise, not these up-or-down votes, on back room deals, which are not just against transparency, but against democracy itself. Money is no longer also free speech; it's the only free speech.

The abandoned Senate version of the Stock Act provisions would have tracked the exploding business of selling advance DC insider tips to wealthy investors, so they can move markets or otherwise make killings. Already estimated at $400 million a year, this industry, called political intelligence, refers only to the sales of DC insider tips. Not the actual looting Wall Street can do with advance tips on how rules and laws will affect stocks and markets. Some in Congress are saying, like President Obama, that it'll take another bill in Congress to stop DC corruption. When the Senate cannot even do their job, for a bill that they themselves all voted for, for threat of a GOP filibuster against reconciliation commitee appointees, the jig is up.