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dent regulatory body must protect consumers from predatory<br />
practices.<br />
As Wall Street corporations grew bigger and bigger until<br />
they were ‘too big to fail,’ they also became so politically powerful<br />
that they led to distorted and unfair policies that served<br />
companies, not citizens.<br />
It’s not enough to try to patch up the current system. We<br />
demand serious reform that fixes the root problems in our<br />
political and economic system: excessive influence of banks,<br />
dangerous compensation systems, and massive consolidation.<br />
And we demand that the reform happen in an open and<br />
transparent manner. (See ANewWayForward.org for more<br />
information.)<br />
Demands like these are always up against the forces mobilized<br />
to keep things the way they are, to save the status quo,<br />
as has often happened after crises like this according to muckraker<br />
Gary Weiss who argues:<br />
After every major crisis, there has been a return to business<br />
as usual. And, criminal acts, types of fraud, practices that are<br />
improper, which, are going to be causing problems several<br />
years from now – they’re just starting to take place right now.<br />
I don’t know what they are, but you can bet that a whole new<br />
wave of criminal actions is just now taking, beginning to take,<br />
in corporate, in global corporations on Wall Street.<br />
Already the big boys in the big banks want to calm and massage<br />
public opinion. JPMorgan Chase overlord Jamie Dimon<br />
speaks for the industry in saying, “if you let them vilify us too<br />
much, the economic recovery will be greatly delayed.”<br />
Yet, we are not talking about vilification, but structural<br />
reform and change. Simon Johnson of MIT sees the emerging<br />
conflict this way:<br />
The “center vs. the pitchforks” idea fundamentally misconstrues<br />
the current debate. This is not about angry left or right<br />
against the center. It’s about centrist technocrats (close to
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