Senate Hopeful Mike Castle tried to fellate the credit card industry yesterday, but he failed. You see, the Democratic majority passed consumer friendly credit card reforms in April, but such reforms did not take effect until 2010. So what did the credit card companies do? They raised their rates, hiked their fees and generally put the screws to the consumer while they still could.
The reforms passed in April were to limit when interest rates can be hiked and requires 45 days’ advance notice of significant changes in card terms. Further, retroactive interest rate increases were to be banned, and interest rates cannot increase during the first year of a new card account. Further, the bill banned universal default, double-cycle billing, over limit fees, excessive late payment fees, dormancy or inactivity fees, and credit cards for people under the age of 21 unless the parent is a co-signor. The bill also extended the life of those gift certificate cards.
What does our good ole flip flopping fake moderate Mike Castle do? He votes for the bill in April, but when the Democratic Congress decided to screw the card companies back for screwing the consumer, Mike Castle decides it was time to screw his constituents once more, since it had been a while.
Lawmakers voted 331-92 to pass legislation to halt rate hikes that credit card companies began imposing after Congress passed credit card reform legislation earlier this year, and move up the reforms to December instead of February. Castle, R-Del., who voted for the original reforms in April, tried to delay Wednesday’s vote by calling for the Federal Reserve to submit a study to Congress within a week on whether speeding up the reform schedule would be feasible. He said credit card companies have a lot of work to do to prepare for the new law. His proposal failed on a mostly party-line vote of 253-171.
Castle said the reform issue is significant in banking states like Delaware.
“They have already lost jobs in the banking world,” he said. “They continue to, and my judgment is that we do need to give them the time to properly implement acts such as this.”
They had time, you freaking pissant Castle. These reforms passed in April, over six months ago, and they used that time to screw the consumer, your constituents, instead of preparing for the rule changes. You see, the banks don’t vote for you, you big eared Alfred E. Neumann stand in. The consumers do. You are elected to serve us, not the banks. The banks were given time to adjust to the new rules, and they made profit off the backs of your constituents. So if you are so worried about banking jobs being lost, all you have to do is tell your banking friends to use those profits to “adjust” to the rule changes.