Durbin's Outrageous Bailout for BP

It’s hard to imagine that the Senate Financial Reform legislation could get worse, but thanks to an amendment offered by Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL), not only did the legislation get worse, it now adds insult to injury.

It’s no secret that the Financial Reform bill will end privacy for financial transactions, create a regulatory bureaucracy like we have never seen before and make bailouts of big banks and Wall Street the permanent policy of the US government. What most people don’t realize is the latest Durbin amendment extends what amounts to a bailout to major retailers and big oil companies.

At the same time when oil companies are shattering profit records and British Petroleum (BP) is spewing hundreds of thousands of gallons of oil into the Gulf Coast polluting the environment the Senate decided to hand them a massive check — paid for by consumers.

Here’s how:

The Durbin amendment imposes a price control scheme on the fees oil companies and retailers pay when they accept payment by credit cards. The amendment was conceived and pushed for by lobbyists for big oil companies and big retailers like BP and Wal-Mart. Their goal is simple — shift the costs of accepting credit cards from their bottom line to the consumers.

Durbin admitted that he offered the amendment after detailed discussions with a big retailer CEO. The bottom line is that the Durbin amendment will put billions of dollars into the pockets of Wal-Mart, big oil companies like BP and other big box retailers who depend on consumers and their credit cards for revenue. It’s unfathomable that while the government has opened a criminal investigation into BP, the US Senate wants to hand them a massive check. Under the Durbin “BP Bailout” amendment, giant corporations will no longer be required to pay their fair share of the costs of receiving these services. Consumers will now pay those costs.

The Durbin amendment is a bailout for a new set of corporations looking to dine at the public trough. The Financial Reform bill gives bailouts to Wall Street and big banks and now others like BP and Wal-Mart have come asking for their piece of the pie.

These companies should pay for the services they choose to use and stop using lobbyists to rig the system and rob consumers.