Political Ruminations

Obama Campaign Responds to Mitt Romney’s Remarks About the Recess Appointment of Richard Cordray

On Wednesday, Mitt Romney called the recess appointment of Richard Cordray to the Consumer Financial Protection Agency “Chicago-style politics”. The Obama Campaign hit back hard, slamming the flip-flopping Wall Streeter:

“Mitt Romney today stood with predatory lenders and Republicans in Congress over the middle class. He doubled down on his promise to eliminate the Wall Street watchdog and allow Wall Street to write its own rules again, leaving consumers vulnerable to hidden fees, financial traps and excessive risk taking that will hit their pocketbooks. Governor Romney has made clear he has not learned the lessons of the economic crisis, instead, he’s giving the most irresponsible financial actors a bright green light to pursue profit at any cost to communities across America.”

Game on.

Full Text Transcript & Video: Remarks by President Obama on the Appointment of Richard Cordray

Video after the jump.

January 04, 2012

Remarks by the President on the Economy

Shaker Heights High School
Shaker Heights, Ohio

1:26 P.M. EST

THE PRESIDENT:  Hello, Ohio!  (Applause.)  Ah, it is good to be back in Ohio.  (Applause.)  It is good to be back in Shaker Heights -- (applause) -- home of the Red Raiders.  (Applause.) 

AUDIENCE MEMBER:  Mr. President, I love you!

THE PRESIDENT:  I love you back.  And I'm glad to be back.  (Applause.)  I'm glad to be here. 

I want to thank your mayor, Earl Leiken, for hosting us today; -- (applause) -- your superintendent, Mark Freeman; -- (applause) -- the principal here, Mike Griffith.  (Applause.)  Well, and I know -- I'm pretty sure we've got a couple of congresspeople here, but I don't see them.  Where are they?  Okay, we've got Marcia Fudge.  (Applause.) Marcy Kaptur is here. (Applause.)  Dennis Kucinich.  (Applause.)  Betty Sutton in the house.  (Applause.)  Outstanding members of Congress, doing the right thing every day.  So we thank them all for being here.  (Applause.)

Rick Santorum to Senate: Obstruction is Good

Rick Santorum tells a Rotary Club that he’d refuse to work (if he were still a senator)in response to Pres. Obama’s recess appointment of Richard Cordray to Director of the Consumer Financial Protection Agency:

“I’d go to the ramparts on this one,” Santorum said at a Rotary Club breakfast in Manchester, New Hampshire. “I hope that the Senate has the backbone to say, ‘You will withdraw these nominations or we are doing nothing.”

This is a perfectly legal move  that was made in order to get around three years of GOP obstruction, for the protection of 99% of the American people, but I think we can infer from his comment that Rick Santorum thinks it’s far more important to continue obstructing the business of the American people.

Mitt Romney Denounces Cordray Appointment to Consumer Watchdog Agency, Stands With the 1%

Mitt Romney is of and by the 1%, and this is most easily seen when you realize that Romney is the ONLY candidate on either side whose top 5 largest contributors are Wall Street firms:

Goldman Sachs: $367,200
Credit Suisse Group: $203,750
Morgan Stanley: $199,800
HIG Capital: $186,500
Barclays: $157,750

It’s little wonder that Mitt Romney, the cofounder of private-equity firm Bain Capital, has banked more than $1.1 million from the financial-services industry for his presidential run. Romney still has strong ties to Wall Street, and each year his own bank account benefits to the tune of millions of dollars, per his retirement agreement with Bain.

On Wednesday, President Obama surmounted three years of  GOP obstruction by recess appointing a director to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau yesterday. The Hill:

Earlier in the day Obama announced he would circumvent the Senate and make a recess appointment to put Cordray in charge of the bureau. That decision comes in response to Republicans refusing to hold confirmation hearings for Cordray [just as they refused to do so for Elizabeth Warren for three years] until the White House modified the bureau so it has more oversight and is run by a small panel rather than one director.

In a statement issued by Romney, he and his fellow Republicans are all about the bullshit regarding recess appointments,  Romney calling  it “Chicago-style politics at its worst”:

“Instead of working with Congress to fix the flaws in this new bureaucracy, the president is declaring that he 'refuses to take no for an answer’ and circumventing Congress to appoint a new administrator,”  Romney said in a statement. “This action represents Chicago-style politics at its worst and is precisely what then-Sen. eleObama claimed would be ‘the wrong thing to do.’ Sadly, instead of focusing on economic growth, he is once again focusing on creating more regulation, more government and more Washington gridlock.”

The fact is that President Obama has tried for three years to get the obstructive 111th & 112th Congresses to confirm a director. They have refused to do so because they want the regulatory agency to die.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce the One Percent stands with Romney for the 1 percent, against the 99 percent, threatening a lawsuit against the Obama Administration.

Oh, and just so we’re clear, Republicans have no problem whatsoever with recess appointments when they are the party in power. Adam Serwer:

According to reports from the Congressional Research Service, during their time in office President Ronald Reagan made 240 recess appointments, President George H. W. Bush made 77 recess appointments, President Bill Clinton made 140 recess appointments, and George W. Bush made 171. Obama's first term has seen a paltry 28.