Theses Iowa radicals–CCI– are fanatics.   Check this out:

The Wells Fargo protest will be in Des Moines on Tuesday, Jan. 26.

Wells Fargo is hurting hardworking families. They pour money into lobbying against meaningful financial reform. At the same time, they are foreclosing on families and financing payday lenders that charge hardworking families 400 percent interest rates. Iowans say enough is enough.

CCI’s demands for Wells Fargo include:

- Stop financing payday lenders that trap people in a cycle of debt and suck tens of millions of dollars out of our communities each year.
- Modify more loans to keep families in their homes.
- Cancel your bonuses; instead use them to relieve state budget crises.
- Stop lobbying against the people, instead lobby for the Consumer Financial Protection Agency and other financial reforms that put people first.

Hey, Wells Fargo is just about the last bank in the country still making mortgages.  Leave them alone.   And they offer a competitive alternative product to payday loans.    Why doesn’t CCI get into the business of offering a payday loan alternative instead of holding protests against institutions like payday lenders and Wells Fargo  that help out working families?

The banking industry has three lobbyists for every member of Congress.

I’m not fond of either of them:

{South Carolina legislators} Ford and Sheheen both favored tougher sentences for violent crime and sided against the payday lending industry.

Congress or the U.S. Supreme Court should invalidate state usury laws which violate the Ninth Amendment right of citizens to freedoms not specifically enumerated elsewhere in the Constitution. Interest rate caps essentially ban small-dollar short-term lending to people without good credit, an extremely important service and economic enterprise, and they also violate the separation of Church and State as they are founded in religious ideas. In a free society the price of loans should be determined by competition in the marketplace, not the dictates of those who want to force their beliefs on others.

Boston Globe promotes Elizabeth Warren for Senate.

This article about the CFPA spreads misinformation:

The idea is to have just one agency that regulates everything financial – from credit cards to mortgages, even pawn shops and payday loan places. There are dozens of agencies now that regulate these different companies, but many argue they have been asleep at the wheel. Some say if we had this agency years ago, we might not be in the mess we’re in today.

Payday lending is regulated by the states, not the federal government, and should stay that way.

Elizabeth Warren today:

If the financial reform bill doesn’t establish an effective and independent consumer protection agency, Congress would be better off passing nothing at all, Elizabeth Warren warned on Friday.

Okay with me.

New York’s Mayor Bloomberg criticizes Obama’s financial regulatory plan:

…Mayor Bloomberg said the banks and Wall Street are part of the bedrock of the city’s economy, and efforts to slash their business just means less tax revenue for the city, which brings up the dreaded “L” word.

“If that’s the case then we’ll have to lay off people because it will really hurt our industry,” Bloomberg said.

Yes, and if payday lending and other small loans are regulated out of business, hundreds of thousands of people will be hurt as well.

S.F. Mayor Gavin Newsom touts the new local payday loan “alternative” in today’s Huffington Post.  His trashing of payday lenders, however, is misguided and uninformed.

From today’s Washington Examiner:

One of Virginia’s largest credit unions has received a boost lately thanks to state employees who must join its ranks under a new state loan program.

Operating the Virginia State Employee Loan Program, the Virginia Credit Union has seen an uptick in membership partially because state workers must join the group to access the short-term aid. The initiative, touted as an alternative to traditional payday lenders, has provided more than $1.3 million in loans to nearly 2,800 state employees — at a 25 percent interest rate.

Virginia Credit Union officials say the programis a way to meet the financial demands of state employees, not pad membership.

When asked if the program stimulated the credit union, spokesman Glenn Birch said, “Absolutely not,” adding, “The program is not a moneymaker at all.”