In today’s totally sexy news, the Direct Marketing Association scored a victory against those pesky folks at the Federal Trade Commission as the Senate rejected a House proposal three times over to expand the powers of the FTC across all but a few sectors of the American economy.
Under the proposed act–or as it’s known in Washington, Restoring American Financial Stability Act (H.R. 4173)–the FTC would basically have carte blanche as an unelected legislature, governing industries and sectors that had apparently had nothing to do with the financial crisis. The DMA has the dynamic duo of Senate Banking Chairman Chris Dodd (D-CT) and House Financial Services Chairman Barney Frank (D-MA) to thank as the heads of the Conference Committee that negotiated this act squashed the House’s dreams of putting these provisions into law before sending their final Conference Report back to each chamber for votes. Of course, it’s still up to President Obama to sign the bill and make everything copacetic in the end.