A Little Perspective on the Press

[Courtney Knapp]

This morning, financial reform legislation was completed by a conference committee of House and Senate negotiators. The conference committee is rewriting the rules of the financial system in the biggest, most complicated piece of legislation since the Great Depression.

Lawmakers look to present the completed bill, now known as the Dodd-Frank Act, to President Barack Obama ahead of a week-long congressional recess set to commence July 3. The final bill calls for raising $4 billion per year during the next five years to fund most of the measure's $22 billion price tag through assessments on financial institutions with more than $50 billion in assets and hedge funds and mutual funds with more than $10 billion in assets.

Immediately following the committee, the press was on board Air Force One with the president and his press secretary on their way to Toronto. This was the first question out of the gate:

Q. Robert, with regulatory reform now building on the health care bill, the stimulus bill, how can the President try and capitalize on these wins over the last year and a half heading into November?

So, Air Force One is on its way to Toronto, where the president will try to sell the rest of the world on a package based on the complicated, 2000 page bill that has just been written with the hope that it will save the global financial system. The topic of the first question? Electoral strategy!