Wall Street Reform bill passes, splits Ohio leaders along partisan, ideological lines
Columbus Examiner – COLUMBUS, Ohio – The vote Thursday afternoon on the Dodd-Frank bill that made long-sought reforms to how Wall Street works, not surprisingly, divided Ohio's elected leaders, those in Washington and those in Columbus, along partisan and ideological lines.
By a vote of 60-39, the U.S. Senate sent President Obama, for his signature, a bill – H.R. 4173; Restoring American Financial Stability Act of 2010 – that some say reforms for the better how Wall Street conducts business while others say it is either mis-guided or not strong enough.
The bill, now named for the respective chairmen of the Senate and House committees that handled the bill – Sen. Christopher Dodd of Connecticut and Rep. Barney Frank of Massachusetts – reached the magic number of 60 votes, so members can close debate and vote on a bill, with the help of three Republican Senators – Collins and Snowe of Maine and Scott Brown of Massachusetts. One Democrat, Russ Feingold of Wisconsin, joined 38 Republicans to vote no.
Feingold, like Voinovich, says the bill "doesn't do the job." He said it does nothing to reimpose the firewall that came with the Glass-Steagall Act of 1933 that separated traditional banking from investment banking activities. He said the bill also doesn't address the issue of "too big to fail." Feingold, who voted against the bailout of Wall Street, said the bill is not what it claims to be.
