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Bailouts, big lies and moral bankruptcy
Bailouts, big lies and moral bankruptcy Evidently we’re not the only ones who are growing dizzy from all the spinning Wall Street is doing as it desperately tries to trick the American public into...
Focused
Focused Focus! The singular mission of ICBA is to enhance and protect the community bank charter—period. Never was the benefit of that focus more apparent than last Thursday when the Senate voted...
Calm Before the Storm
Calm Before the Storm Lawmakers are often a raucous bunch when they’re together, but Capitol Hill remains unusually quiet after the Labor Day holiday. Most members of Congress are still back in...
The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine
The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine If you want to know who and what really triggered the financial chaos and calamity through which we all have just lived, a must read is The Big Short by...
FDIC Long-Term Plan Offers Short-Term Relief
FDIC Long-Term Plan Offers Short-Term Relief At a time when good news is hard to come by in the financial services industry, or anywhere for that matter, the FDIC’s recently proposed Deposit...
ICBA Convention on Pace for Banner Year
ICBA Convention on Pace for Banner Year When I was still running my community bank in Missouri, it was always important to me to find a way to get away for a week in March to attend ICBA’s National...
Community Bankers Take to the Hill
Community Bankers Take to the Hill It’s been a great week in Washington. While there is still a long row to hoe on a number of issues facing community banks, we made great progress this week as...
Taking Responsibility and Standing Tall
Taking Responsibility and Standing Tall Last week, as the great financial reform debate went into extra innings, temperatures were rising and everyone was tense and tired. When the conference...
Real Facts, and Beer
Real Facts, and Beer Lots of Washington, D.C., "pundits" and some association executives are sending out messages and summaries opining on the Dodd/Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection...
Reputations Intact: Proud To Be a Community Banker
Reputations Intact: Proud To Be a Community Banker One of the sad facts of this modern world in which we live is that we are bombarded with "messaging" nearly 24 hours a day. Our senses are...
Wanted: Sanity in the Exam Environment
Wanted: Sanity in the Exam Environment Albert Einstein defined insanity as doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result. Given that definition, to many observers ICBA’s...
Persistence Pays Off on Small Business Jobs Act
Persistence Pays Off on Small Business Jobs Act The long and winding road of passing legislation to stimulate the small-business sector came to a successful end this week as the House voted to send...
Credit Unions Having Their Cake and Eating it Too
Credit Unions Having Their Cake and Eating it Too It’s official: The nation’s credit unions get to have their tax-exempt cake and eat it too! Federal regulators last Friday afternoon announced a...
A Robo-Sign of the Times
A Robo-Sign of the Times The so-called Masters of the Universe are at it again. Some of the same large financial institutions that caused the financial crisis have engaged in practices that could...
We the People
We the People We the People go to the polls today to engage in our sacred, inalienable right. The outcome of today’s midterm congressional elections will select the citizens who will come to...
A Sea Change
A Sea Change Acting Comptroller of the Currency John Walsh called it a “sea change.” He’s right. Today the FDIC board of directors voted to base assessments on assets minus tangible capital instead...
Deal on Tax Extenders Could Offer Holiday Cheer
Deal on Tax Extenders Could Offer Holiday Cheer Bipartisanship can be hard to come by in Washington, but there are encouraging signs that Congress and the administration have heard the voice of...
Recalling the Harsh Lessons of the Past
Recalling the Harsh Lessons of the Past More than three years ago I wrote the following article on the dangers of uncontrolled competition and overconcentration in the financial markets. Having...
ICBA United to Work with Divided Congress
ICBA United to Work with Divided Congress Congress will have a new look when it returns to Washington this week. With a Republican House and Democratic Senate following November’s elections, many...
Regulatory Review Must Deliver Results
Regulatory Review Must Deliver Results It sounds like a step in the right direction. President Obama recently ordered federal agencies and departments to review regulations and to consider ways to...
“Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps,” and Neither Does ICBA
“Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps,” and Neither Does ICBA Usually the time I spend on a plane is a way to lose myself in a book, reflect, catch up on work or perhaps enjoy a movie. On a recent trip,...
Stop Punishing Main Street Banks and Their Customers
Stop Punishing Main Street Banks and Their Customers Hey, here’s an idea. Let’s punish the thousands of small community banks that played by the rules and stuck by their customers during the...
Love is in the Air for Community Banks
Love is in the Air for Community Banks I’m not one for schmaltzy dramas. For those of you who don’t know, I’m more likely to take in a movie with scenes from Gettysburg or Omaha Beach. But this...
ICBA Convention Recognizes America’s Financial Foundation
ICBA Convention Recognizes America’s Financial Foundation Last week several thousand community bankers met in San Diego at the national convention of the Independent Community Bankers of America....
Interchange Legislation—A Reason to Dig Deep
Interchange Legislation—A Reason to Dig Deep The will of the nation’s community bankers to make their voices heard in Congress has never ceased to amaze me. Once again, it is time for community...
Cramdown: A Bad Idea That Continues to Smolder
Cramdown: A Bad Idea That Continues to Smolder Sometimes bad ideas are like grease fires—they can be hard to extinguish for good. In fact, one bad idea that ICBA has repeatedly doused with common...
Drawing Parallels to a Nation at War With Itself
Drawing Parallels to a Nation at War With Itself I just got back from an Executive Committee meeting in the great state of New Mexico. On April 12, 1861, guns in Charleston harbor opened up on Fort...
Big-Box Stores Selling Smoke and Mirrors on Interchange
Big-Box Stores Selling Smoke and Mirrors on Interchange A recent Washington Post op-ed suggests that small businesses should be wary of the promises of big-box retailers. A study conducted by David...
Strike Zones, 60 Votes and the Interchange Amendment
Strike Zones, 60 Votes and the Interchange Amendment When I was young I was a baseball player—a southpaw pitcher. I learned early on that each umpire had a slightly different variation on the...
The Genius of General Grant and Community Banks
The Genius of General Grant and Community Banks General Grant did not win one single battle against General Lee’s vaunted Army of Northern Virginia until the last nine days of the Civil War—but he...
ICBA: Celebrating Independence Every Day
ICBA: Celebrating Independence Every Day Like many of you, I got to enjoy our recent July 4th holiday with the essential ingredients for celebrating our Independence Day: family, friends, food and...
ICBA Looking Ahead at One-Year Mark
ICBA Looking Ahead at One-Year Mark It’s hard to believe, but one year ago President Obama signed into law perhaps the most significant financial reform bill in my lifetime. A year later, the...
Backdoor Bailout for Wall Street, Back of the Hand for Main Street
Backdoor Bailout for Wall Street, Back of the Hand for Main Street After nearly a decade of living inside the beltway, not much happens in Washington that surprises me anymore. But I was astounded...
Jackson Hole, Bernanke and Lagarde
Jackson Hole, Bernanke and Lagarde I returned from the Jackson Hole Federal Reserve Economic Symposium having listened to Federal Reserve Board Chairman Bernanke and International Monetary Fund...
How You See the Glass Sets Your Future
How You See the Glass Sets Your Future Experience has convinced me that Norman Vincent Peal was right! How you think of the future will determine it. If you always see half-empty glasses, that is...
Cockroaches and Community Banks
Cockroaches and Community Banks The exterminators are at it again. Another “pundit” is spraying around the latest prediction on the demise of the community banking industry. This particular...
Merchants Having it Both Ways on Interchange and Fraud
Merchants Having it Both Ways on Interchange and Fraud A recent security breach helps demonstrate that when it comes to fraud and interchange price fixing, merchants apparently are looking to have...
Regulatory Burden, Community Banks, and Voices
Regulatory Burden, Community Banks, and Voices There is no doubt that community banks are suffering under a plethora of stifling and, in many cases, unnecessary regulations. For several decades...
Assessment Savings a Testament to Community Bank Resilience
Assessment Savings a Testament to Community Bank Resilience For years we made the case that the deposit-insurance assessment base is unfair for community banks. And for years no one seemed to...
One Size Does Not Fit All
One Size Does Not Fit All The community bank business model is nothing like the Wall Street business model. So why would we want Wall Street firms or mortgage banks to speak for us any more than...