Senate Passes Credit Card Legislation

For folks who are interested (and truth be told, almost everyone has an interest in this) the Senate just passed their version of the new credit card regulations bill. The final vote on the Senate bill, widely perceived to be tougher than the House bill, was 90-5.

I'll generally leave the analysis to folks with more expertise on the issue, the NYT is out of the box with a "Consumer's Guide" to the new law and I know some of our folks have lots to say on this topic. However, there are a couple of interesting and noteworthy items here:

First, the Senate bill includes the Coburn amendment on carrying guns in the National Park System. The House leadership appears to have decided they're going to swallow that even if they don't like it. They want to get a bill to Obama as quickly as possible and it looks like they don't think they can win a fight on the amendment anyway.

Second, while the Senate bill is seen as being "tougher" and pushing farther than the House bill, the real credit for this measure goes to Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney (D-NY-14) who organized and advocated and twisted arms to get this bill moving over the past several years. Not to take anything away from Senator Dodd, but it's Maloney who has been the bulldog on this for a long time now.

Finally, among the five votes against the bill there were four Republicans and one Democrat. That Democrat was Senator Tim Johnson, who was joined by his fellow South Dakotan, Senator John Thune, in opposing the bill. Not much of a surprise there for folks who have been following this issue.