Yep, the banksters have a LOT to be thankful for - massive bailouts and no regulation

meanwhile, all we peasants can expect is a lump of coal in our christmas stockings...

from the wapo... (the strikeout is mine...)

The nation's bankers banksters have much to be thankful for as they sit down to their turkey dinners on Thursday.

At this time last year, the American financial system was near collapse, rescued only by hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars. Now the system has stabilized, and the industry is on the verge of a coup that many would have thought impossible a year ago: an escape from any major reform of financial regulations.

On Tuesday, the American Financial Services Association even held a conference call with reporters to update them on its efforts -- successful so far -- to torpedo plans for a new Consumer Financial Protection Agency, which would protect people from the sort of lending abuses that led to last year's implosion.

The ASFA, a trade group of credit card issuers, auto-finance companies, mortgage lenders and others leading the fight against the CFPA, took the unusual approach on Tuesday of publicly celebrating the reform's fading prospects.

"This was supposed to be a slam-dunk," crowed Bill Hempler, the group's top lobbyist. But instead, he said, "Democratic members are increasingly having heartburn over CFPA and maybe second thoughts."

[...]

Now these same companies [CIT, CitiFinancial, Countrywide, EquiFirst, HSBC, Morgan Stanley, Wells Fargo Financial and GMAC], suffering from some combination of amnesia and ingratitude, are determined to fight off regulatory efforts to prevent a repeat of the same cycle of bubble, collapse and bailout. Big firms such as J.P. Morgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, Citigroup and Bank of America -- direct or indirect beneficiaries of federal bailouts -- are all battling efforts to rein in derivatives. And credit card issuers, facing new regulations scheduled to take effect in February, have responded by increasing their rates and fees.

check THIS as a rationale for fighting re-regulation...

[T]he argument most likely to prevail for the financial firms on Capitol Hill was offered by Chris Stinebert, the trade group's chief. "Especially now, when we're in a very, very sensitive time, when the capital markets are just starting to recover," he said, "introducing a high level of uncertainty in the marketplace could be very detrimental."

amazingly enough, dana milbank, well-known for shilling the views of his ultra-establishment employer, actually decides to call a spade a spade...

Or, to put it another way: Don't regulate us now because the economy is still suffering from the mess we made because we weren't regulated the last time. Chutzpah, it appears, is recession-proof.

how long will it take the long-suffering citizens of our formerly devoted-to-the-common-good country to realize we've been the victims of yet another coup d'etat, this one of truly staggering proportions... bless the 17+% unemployed who owe their circumstances largely to the banksters... and fie on the banksters who will be celebrating the latest fast one they pulled on us peasants...

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