President Obama and Jamie Dimon

It is hard enough for Democrats to accept the title of this piece let alone the fact of these two men working together to lobby Democrats to vote for the passage of a bill!  What?  President Obama working with Jamie Dimon to get the House to pass a bill that both feel is in the best interest of the American people.  Is this some kind of a sick joke?

No, this is something that actually happened.  If Jamie Dimon is for the passage of this bill, it speaks volumes since he is chairman of the board, president and chief executive officer of one of the big four banks in America.  And although House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Senator Elizabeth Warren came out against the passage of this bill, it passed in the House and is awaiting approval by the Senate.

I love and strongly support President Barack Obama but I must side with House Minority Leader Pelosi and Senator Warren on this issue.  The bill that President Obama is supporting would once again allow Wall Street to flex its political muscle.  Although there are a lot of good things in the bill that President Obama is supporting, the fact that it would reinforce Wall Street’s long unchallenged feeling that it actually is the POTUS is worth the stance taken by House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Senator Elizabeth Warren.

This bill would do many things to help the majority of American citizens but it would also allow big banks that took America and the world economy to the brink of disaster, until American taxpayers bailed them out, to go right back to the way that they were operating before their bailout in 2008; without being held accountable.

The banks did not lose anything but many average Americans lost everything; their homes, their pensions, their savings and their dreams.  That is why it is so baffling that the President would support the passage of this bill.  It is also why Senator Warren’s question to congress should resonate with the preponderance of Americans; “Who do you work for, Wall Street or the American people?”

The majority of the American people are not strangers to hurting, being ignored and jerked around by politicians.  So to give big banks a second chance at ruining America’s economy and the world economy in order to underpin fledgling programs does not make sense.  It is as if this administration does not recognize the magnitude of what our country and the world narrowly escaped.

I do not want the government to shut down because I am retired and depend on my Social Security payments along with my retirement checks to survive.  But to put our children’s future in jeopardy as a result of putting our country’s economy and the world economy in jeopardy so that big banks in America can hedge their bets against derivatives in the event that they fail in order to protect their bottom lines is ludicrous.

What this amounts to for banks and their foray into derivatives is that if they win they make tons of money to keep for them and if they lose then taxpayers pay and, if anything, get a salute; a one finger salute!  For far too long banks, especially big banks, have been allowed to have their way with us.  They have become accustom to this and now expect everyone to lie down, roll over, and fetch at their command.  And if we don’t, although they have tons of money in reserve, they withhold it from the American people.  Enough already!

There is no doubt that it is going to hurt and be a struggle if we fight back against this kind of unfairness.  Powerful people never tire of raking more onto their plates for fear that other powerful people will have more than they have because they are blinded by their greed.  But all Americans must fight back if we are to save our country.  American greed is already out of control and if average Americans do not stand up to this egregious attack on fairness and the true American way, who knows where we will end up.

Eulus Dennis