My guestimate was that it would take about 48 hours for this story to come out. And here it is, right on schedule:
During the years that Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr. was helping the credit card industry win passage of a law making it harder for consumers to file for bankruptcy protection, his son had a consulting agreement that lasted five years with one of the largest companies pushing for the changes, aides to Senator Barack Obama’s presidential campaign acknowledged Sunday.
In other words, when Biden gets up there and talks poignantly about the typical American family sitting around the kitchen table late at night worrying how to pay its bills, and then twists the dagger on John McCain's seven kitchen tables, it's a great line politically. but....
It's a total crock, and Biden ought to be embarassed. The sad truth is that Biden not only supported but aggressively pushed for a conservative, anti-working class bill that made life a lot harder for that family that he talked about. Here's a little of the background:
The financial services industry began seeking relief from Congress in the mid-1990s from an increase in bankruptcies that was cutting into its profits. Its initial support came from Republican lawmakers, who repeatedly introduced bills to make it more difficult for consumers to erase their debts. During that time, executives at MBNA, which was bought in 2006 by Bank of America, began donating heavily to both major political parties and many national politicians, including Mr. Biden.
And:
Consumer advocates say that Senator Biden was one of the first Democratic leaders to support the bankruptcy bill, and he voted for it four times — in 1998, 2000, 2001 and in March 2005, when its final version passed the Senate by a vote of 74 to 25.
Travis Plunkett, legislative director of the Consumer Federation of America, a consumer group that opposed the bill, said that Senator Biden had provided a “veneer of bipartisanship” that eventually helped the credit card companies win over other Democrats. “He provided cover to other Democrats to do what the credit industry was urging them to do,” Mr. Plunkett said.
Making this even worse, as the story emphasizes, is that Biden's son Hunter was signed up by the company in a lucrative lobbying deal. On the surface, that really stinks -- but watching these things unfold over the years, I predict that Hunter Biden is probably just another candidate for the Sleazy Relatives Hall of Fame, a long list that includes neer-do-wells in both parties like Roger Clinton, Neil Bush, Billy Carter and Donald Nixon, and these usually only cause minor collatoral damage.
Of course, Delaware is also the credit-card capital of the world, and so you can make the case that this is another example of another fine political tradition -- supporting the big-money interests (and, yes, employers) in your home state over the broader interest of people in all 50 states. That was arguably sort-of OK, maybe, when Biden was just a Delaware guy, but now he's got to explain his bankruptcy vote to families around the kitchen table in places like the hard-hit Mon Valley or California's Central Valley. Good luck with that.
So why would Obama go ahead and pick someone with this kind of baggage? The answer is simple: The Republicans can't attack Biden on this issue, because their record is even worse. John McCain voted for this same sad sop to corporate America (Obama opposed it) and as the Times article notes, executives at MBNA (which has since been bought by Bank of America) were even more enthusiastic about supporting George W. Bush than backing Biden.
Can you imagine a negative ad with satanic music, grainy slow motion shots of Biden, and a narrator saying: "Joe Biden: Sleazy Tool of the Same Corporate Interests That We Support 100 Percent of the Time"? Of course not -- they can't attack Biden for backing something that McCain and Bush also supported. It just means that now Obama, who was on the people's side on this one, now won't be able to hit this issue as hard as he could.
No wonder the greatest enthusiam for Biden is not from party activists but from the usual chattering classes in D.C. As Glenn Greenwald wrote:
Ever since it became clear that Obama would be the likely nominee, the political establishment has been demanding of him more and more proof that his "change" rhetoric is just that -- rhetoric, and not anything meant as a genuine threat to the prevailing order of things. Obama, arguably out of political necessity, has repeatedly obliged, eagerly trying to offer proof that he is no threat to them, and the Biden selection is but the latest step in that campaign of reassurance. In sum, Biden is a reliable supporter of virtually every prevailing bit of conventional wisdom within the American elite political consensus, which is why his selection has been widely praised by the establishment, whose principal concern is that their fiefdom not be disrupted and that their consensus not be challenged.
The bottom line is that Biden's shameless kowtowing to the credit card companies won't hurt him or Barack Obama. The only ones getting hurt are you and me, and that poor struggling family at the kitchen table.
Comment removed.- Comment removed.
In other words: Our VP nominee is corrupt but you can't do anything about it. Ha! Ha! I think there's a difference between supporting a bill, and using that support to set up a lobbying deal with your son. So I think Republicans can do something about it. Ha! Ha!— jmc
Obama can no longer attack McCain on the issue of lobbyists or the bankruptcy bill. If he does, Obama will be called a hypocrite and the media may be forced to cover the contradiction. That is a win for McCain, and a serious hit to Obama's faux populism of the last couple months. (Seriously... family of politicians should not be able to be lobbyists, let alone lobby daddy. That needs to be a law.)— bon- Comment removed.
- Gibba Mang: She released her tax returns more then 4 months ago...— bon
"Get back to me when McCain's family is personally making EVIL PROFITS as a result of his support of the bill." . . . . . Andy McCain did get a seat at the director's table at Silver State Bank within a year, but alas, the bank's gone belly up for making bad loans, and he had to resign for "personal" reasons. So, no evil profits, just evil losses, batty. Make that your talking point, batty, LOL!- Could somebody please explain why people who knowingly overspend SHOULD find it easier to declare bankruptcy for credit card bills? Most of the "poor struggling families at the kitchen table" in credit trouble aren't that way because of illness, or unexpected unemployment - them I can feel sorry for. But most are there because they spent above their means for things they didn't need without giving any thought as to a fallback position if their upwardly-mobile paths took a southerly turn. Its like the people buying McMansions and not even being able to afford furniture for them (I have eyewitness proof of that), thinking (if that even is the applicable word) that the runup in values could go on forever. It is just another version/symptom of the nanny state: oh, the evil credit cards companies offered these people credit and the poor folks were too stupid to add up the numbers, so we must take care of them. I have sympathy for, and am willing to have some of my taxes go to help, the few who have been unlucky; I have no sympathy for the many who refused to use their brains. Biden has his flaws, but this isn't one of them.— what is truth?
- I don't see passing a bill that requires people to take personal responsibility for their finances as 'anti-working class'. I'm no fan of credit card companies, but I don't think they, or any other company, should have to pay for someone elses's financial mismanagement.— Phillysub
- Comment removed.
- "Can you imagine a negative ad with satanic music, grainy slow motion shots of Biden, and a narrator saying: "Joe Biden: Sleazy Tool of the Same Corporate Interests That We Support 100 Percent of the Time"?" Nice try at moral equivalence, Will. There is a vast difference between supporting a bill and getting a direct or indirect financial benefit for supporting it. Biden's son gets a plum consulting gig at MBNA. Chris Dodd gets a $70,000 break on his mortage from Countrywide and then drives legislation that benefits the new owner of Countryside, BofA, at a cost of billions to taxpayers. And well-connected Dems such as Jamie Gorelick turned Fannie Mae into their own personal salad bar - which will also eventually cost taxpayers billions. I do agree the GOP will have a hard time attacking. The question is, where in the heck has your attack on Dodd and Fannie Mae Democrats been? You sure were all over the Abramoff scandal. That was penny-ante corruption. This new Dem corruption is costing taxpayers billions upon billions of dollars.— db_cooper
- Bunch, to suggest that it is "anti-working class" to suggest that people should have to pay for the things that they have purchased is outrageous, even for you. The suggestion that it is ok to live in excess and expect a credit card company to get stuck with the tab is simply absurd. And Biden should be representing the interests of the credit card industry -- doing otherwise would be inconsistent with the notion of Federalism.— jfar86
- If you don't consider giving out credit to people who are, at best, a borderline risk to be "financial mismanagement" on the part of the credit card companies, I can see where you are coming from. Why should we be subsidizing *their* ability to make bad financial decisions? When you look at predatory lending practices and deliberate exploitation of people who, quite frankly, *don't* know better the issue becomes a little more complex than the simple-minded "analysis" of "personal responsibility." Once everyone in the country is as smart as you are then you can assume that they are playing on a level playing field.— E.Plebnista
- "(Seriously... family of politicians should not be able to be lobbyists, let alone lobby daddy. That needs to be a law.)" --- Were you saying this when Bush and Cheney's children were lobbying? Somehow I doubt it... in any case, I don't see why family members should be punished because their relatives went into public service. There should certainly be restrictions and increased scrutiny of family members, but an outright ban is improper.— Politburo
- Comment removed.
Will Bunch, a senior writer at the Philadelphia Daily News, blogs about his obsessions, including national and local politics and world affairs, the media, pop music, the Philadelphia Phillies, soccer and other sports, not necessarily in that order.
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