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Detail Oriented Populism: A PubliCola Interview with Sen. Maria Cantwell

By Josh Feit on February 5, 2010 at 3:27 PM | Comments

Washington state’s junior senator, Sen. Maria Cantwell, is both a technocrat and a populist.

Getting her footing in the Senate just as the Enron debacle was blowing up in the early 2000s, Cantwell found her niche drawing up wonked-out policy from a lefty perspective to protect energy consumers and energy markets. Cantwell spent the first several years of her Senate career doing obscure, yeoman’s corporate accountability work, like passing the Commodities Future Modernization Act to regulate energy derivatives. (And her nerdy but righteous toiling continues: During last year’s health care squabbles, she locked in an unsung corporate accountability amendment to regulate pharmaceutical profiteering by pharmaceutical benefit management companies, PBMs.)

However, as the Democrats struggle to respond to Wall Street wrongdoing and the great recession, Cantwell’s detail-oriented populism has suddenly turned her into a high profile and invaluable Senator for the Democrats—the “Most Valuable Senator” of 2009, according to the lefist mag The Nation.

Cantwell sat down for a 20-minute interview with PubliCola yesterday to talk about her emergence as the Democrats populist all-star (or black sheep?) whose yearlong challenge to Democratic President Barack Obama’s economic policies has put the national spotlight on her banking reform message—a message that may be the Democrats’ only hope of warding off a major backlash from angry voters and Tea Partiers in November.

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PubliCola: I want to talk about the populist note you’ve been hitting nonstop lately. Voting against the bailouts, dressing down [Treasury] Secretary Geithner, voting against [Fed Chair] Bernanke last week—you’ve been consistently sending a message to the Obama administration that on economic policy, they don’t get it. Does President Obama just not get it on economic issues?

Sen. Cantwell: Well, first of all, I think that this is actually a message about competitive capitalism too. I believe in good old-fashioned American capitalism where you have true competition and transparent markets. And that you have money flow to IPOs to create new technology. If you’re spending all your money in dark derivative markets—and that’s more lucrative—then how are you really getting capital flowing to small businesses?

So while it may seem it’s just “populist,” it’s really about what’s made our country great. Getting capital and competition has made our country great. And if the big banks are too big, and they push the small banks out, and more and more concentration of big banks is the norm, that’s going to hurt the competitiveness and effectiveness of getting capital to small businesses.

PubliCola: Do you think that President Obama doesn’t understand that?

Cantwell Votes ‘No’ on Bernanke

By Josh Feit on January 28, 2010 at 3:24 PM | Comments

Sen. Maria Cantwell was one of eleven Democrats to vote ‘Nay’ on Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke’s reconfirmation today, capping her yearlong dissident (and populist) opposition to President Obama’s bank bailout policies.

Sen. Patty Murray voted ‘Yea.’ Here’s the roll call.

Bernanke was reconfirmed, 70-30.

UPDATE: Sen. Cantwell’s press release, where she hypes the legislation she’s co-sponsoring with Sen. John McCain to keep investment bankers’ hands out of commercial banking— is below the fold.

Sen. Patty Murray Says She’ll Support Bernanke Reconfirmation

By Josh Feit on January 28, 2010 at 12:48 PM | Comments

U.S. Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) sent out press release today saying she would vote to reconfirm Federal Reserve chair Ben Bernanke.

Bernanke’s reconfirmation—he’s been accused of failing to see the financial collapse coming and fueling it with naive lax oversight—has become a politically hot issue as President Obama, who supports the reconifirmation, and the Democrats try to navigate populist anger about the economy.

It’s not surprising that Sen. Murray would vote to reconfirm. She has voted the status quo on President Obama’s Wall Street program—as opposed to her colleague Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA), who has been an outspoken critic.

Here is Sen. Murray’s statement:

Sen. Cantwell Still Undecided on Bernanke

By Josh Feit on January 26, 2010 at 3:33 PM | Comments

A big vote is coming up this week in the U.S. Senate (says Paul Krugman): The reconfirmation of Federal Reserve Chair Ben Bernanke, which President Obama supports. Bernanke needs about 45 Democrats to support his reconfirmation (he’s got about 15 Republicans and 29 Democrats so far) to overcome a filibuster.

It’s a big vote because it’s loaded with symbolism for the public re: the bank bailouts and the AIG fiasco. It’s also a tricky moment for Democrats. President Obama needs a win, but the public would like some revenge on Wall Street. This could be a way for Democrats—facing the prospect of a Teapublican backlash in November—to show that they care about Main Street.

Last week, I noted my surprise that Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA) had yet to add her name to the list of Nays, given that Sen. Russ Feingold, who’s been Cantwell’s Democratic ally when it comes to opposing President Obama’s Wall Street policies for the past year, is on the list. (It’s especially surprising given how gung ho Sen. Cantwell was when it came to demanding answers on AIG.)