Binyamin Appelbaum, the New York Times reporter responsible for that surprisingly good and skeptical piece the other day on financial "reform," is becoming a byline to watch for in that paper. Today's installment from Mr. Appelbaum: "one of the most consequential decisions about new restraints on the banking industry — how much more capital banks should hold in their rainy day reserves — is being decided not on Capitol Hill but far from Washington, by a committee based in Basel, Switzerland."
More: "The world's largest banks have responded with consternation, arguing that the proposed standards would tie up too much money that otherwise could be used for lending, a loss that would curtail economic growth....For instance, analysts for JPMorgan Chase estimated that banks would need to raise prices by 33 percent to maintain profits. They also predicted that the Basel proposals would reduce the gross domestic product of the United States by 'a multiple' of $30 billion."
We've been warning here for some time about power slipping away from elected representatives in Washington and into the hands of international bureaucrats. Glenn Beck spoke about it on TV the other night and prefaced it with a warning that his critics were going to call him a crazy fear-mongering conspiracy theorist for even mentioning it. Partly for that reason, it's terrific to see the Times marking the point this clearly.
