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We've covered both of these stories here, whether it's the "too big to jail" corrupt HSBC, or the out of touch greedy AIG, which was considering suing the taxpayers after they'd bailed them out. This Wednesday evening, The Daily Show's Jon Stewart took his turn going after them.

AIG decided not to join their former CEO "Hank" Greenberg's lawsuit against the government after all. I guess they took a look at those booming sales of pitchforks and torches and decided it might not bode well for them to do so.

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For anyone that didn't catch it, go watch Moyers' interview with David Corn and Kevin Drum:

America's big banks are back on top. Just a year after their financial gambles brought the American economy to the brink of collapse, requiring a massive federal bailout, they're back in the black and paying themselves healthy bonuses. With so many Americans facing economic hardship, the banks' good fortunes have led to resentment and even some rage among those outside the financial industry. Yet, according to Washington watchers — and sheer dollars spent — the banking industry lobby remains among the most powerful in the nation's capital.The latest issue of MOTHER JONES magazine looks into this discrepancy, calling it the "accountability deficit." The magazine commissioned a series of articles investigating why no one has been brought to account for crashing the economy. Two contributors to the issue, David Corn and Kevin Drum, join Bill Moyers on the JOURNAL to explain how the banking lobby continues to hold so much power in the nation's capital.

Here is Bill's commentary following the segment.

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From The Gavel--Debate Begins On The Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act:

Tonight, the House begins consideration of HR 4173, the Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. This comprehensive financial regulation reform bill will enact common-sense reforms including ending bailouts by helping ensure taxpayers are never again on the hook for Wall Street’s risky behavior and bad bets; protecting families’ retirement funds, college savings, and homes and businesses’ financial futures from unnecessary risk by Wall Street lenders and speculators and high-paid corporate executives; protecting consumers from predatory lending abuses, fine print, and industry gimmicks; and finally bringing transparency and accountability to a financial system that has run amok. [...]

Subcommittee Chairman Luis Gutierrez (D-IL) breaks down how the legislative language that Republicans are disingenuously claiming is a ‘bailout fund’ works and why he supports the Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act.

And from Ryan Grim at the HuffPo--Rep. Gutierrez Slams GOP For Misunderstanding Bill:

The GOP claims that the House bill will create a "bailout fund" for systemically important financial institutions. Gutierrez, a member of House leadership, pointed out that the bill does not, in fact, contain such a fund. [...]

What the bill does do, he explained, is create a fund that major firms must pay into. If banks get into trouble, the fund is used to take them over, break them up and sell off the parts. If such a fund was socialist, Gutierrez said, then so is Geico. But unlike Geico, he said, drivers who crash the economy don't get their bank repaired and returned to them under the Democratic plan.

"What they won't tell you is unlike everybody in this room who has to go and take out an insurance policy to drive a car, they want Wall Street and Goldman Sachs to be able to drive our economy into the ground without paying a cent of insurance in case they act recklessly. And all we're saying as Democrats is: 'It's simple. If you wanna do business in America and you threaten the economic stability of our country, then you gotta pay into an insurance fund.' But lemme tell you. It's not the kind of insurance fund where you get into an accident and they take your car and they fix it and they kind of give it back to you new. No no. In our insurance fund, you know what happens? We chop up your car into pieces and sell it and then we pay back the fund with the pieces. That's our fund. Read the bill. It's a funeral fund. You guys love to talk about the death and death and death when it came to health care. Why don't you talk about our death panels now?"

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From The Ed Schultz Show Nov. 16, 2009. Byron Dorgan ten years after the repeal of The Glass-Steagall Act--let's revisit it. Dorgan talked about splitting up these big investment banks and said too big to fail is too big to exist. Amen brother.

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From Bill Moyers Journal, Simon Johnson paints a bleak picture of what's ahead for us due to Washington's unwillingness to regulate the financial industry and Wall Street.

BILL MOYERS: You asked on your blog, just this week, a question I want to put to you now, and to both of you. You asked, 'Does this crisis reflect something about the disproportionate influence of a few incompetent investment bankers or a deeper breakdown of capitalism?'' What's your answer to your own question?

SIMON JOHNSON: Well, definitely, this disproportionate influence of some fairly incompetent bankers, that's for sure. That's what we're seeing today. That's what we've seen over the past few months. I think on the issue on the issue of capitalism, we have to take this very seriously. To me, at least, the financial part of our capitalism is very seriously broken.

They persuaded us to allow them to take incredible risks. And then they pushed all the downside, all those losses onto us, the taxpayer, at the same time as really hammering hard all the people who were duped, essentially, into taking out loans. People lost their houses. It's an absolute tragedy. This combination cannot go on. And yet, the opportunity for real reform has already passed.

And there is not going to be not only is there not going to be change, but I'll go further. I'll say it's going to be worse, what comes out of this, in terms of the financial system, its power, and what it can get away with.

BILL MOYERS: Why?

SIMON JOHNSON: That's the.

BILL MOYERS: Why is it going to how is it going to be worse?

SIMON JOHNSON: Well, there's four we used to have a dozen or so substantial big banks, now we're down to four. Now we're down to four big banks that have a lot more market power and a lot more political power. They make the campaign contributions. They shape agendas in ways that are that are really quite scary.

If you look, for example, at derivatives. And the debate on whether or not derivatives should be regulated in a sensible manner. And at this point, actually, the Obama Administration has is leaning in a better direction. But the big financial players are absolutely against any kind of sensible regulation. And I think they're going to win.

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Charles Grassley is starting to sound as incoherent during his television interviews as he does in his Tweets. Grassley doesn't think we need more regulation. We just need more transparency. Yeah, that's going to make the finace companies behave. And when asked if the banks are in any position to protest if they're not going to make as much money, Grassley comes back with this:

Greed is human nature. We shouldn't blame greed any more than you'd blame gravity when a plane has an accident and goes down.

I'm sorry Senator, but I think we can blame greed for the mess we're in. Greed and the unwillingness of the government to put a check on it.

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Matt Taibbi talked to Rachel Maddow about his article at Rolling Stone The Big Takeover and what needs to be done with these mega-financial institutions that are too "big to fail".

Maddow: You think the Obama administration should break the financial companies that are in crisis down. Stop letting them get so complex that they can't be understood and they can't be regulated. Why do you think that should happen?

Taibbi: Well first of all I'm obviously not an expert on any of this stuff but I think on this one point the logic here to me doesn't seem all that hard to follow. If these companies are too big to fail, they're too big to exist. In a capitalist society we can't have a situation where all you have to do to stay in business forever is get so big that whenever you screw up the government comes and bails you out.

That's the reason we had the trust busting and the anti-monopoly laws back in the day and I think that's the reason we have to make sure that these companies are manageable and if they are incompetent and irresponsible that we can just let them fail.

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