More of that "hopey changey" stuff

Yeah, this is a "big fucking deal," too.

The bill has been the subject of furious and expensive lobbying efforts by businesses and financial trade groups in recent months. While those efforts produced some specific exceptions to new regulations, by and large the bill’s financial regulations not only remained strong but in some cases gained strength as public outrage grew at the excesses that fueled the financial meltdown of 2008.

Representative Barney Frank of Massachusetts, who shepherded the bill through the House, said the bill benefited from the increased attention that turned to the subject of financial regulation after Congress completed the health care bill.

“Last year when we were debating it in the house, health care was getting all of the attention and it was not as good a bill as I would have liked to bring out because we were not getting public attention,” Mr. Frank said. “What happened was with the passage of health care, the American public started to focus on this.”

Senator Christopher J. Dodd of Connecticut, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, said legislators were still uncertain how the bill will work until it is in place. “But we believe we’ve done something that has been needed for a long time,” he said.

Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner also praised the conference committee for its work. “All Americans have a stake in this bill,” he said. “It will offer families the protections they deserve, help safeguard their financial security and give the businesses of America access to the credit they need to expand and innovate.”

Legislators had aimed to finish their reconciliation work before President Obama travels to a G-20 meeting this weekend in Ontario, and to approve and deliver a final bill for the president’s signature by Independence Day.

At two minutes before midnight Thursday, some 14 1/2 hours after they began work Thursday morning, members of the House-Senate conference committee approved a final revision of the measure known popularly as the Volcker Rule.

The rule, named for Paul A. Volcker, the former Federal Reserve chairman who proposed the measure this year, restricts the ability of banks whose deposits are federally insured from trading for their own benefit. That measure had been fiercely opposed by banks and large Wall Street firms, who viewed it as a major incursion on some of their most profitable activities.

We can complain about all the back room dealing, but this is a pretty spectacular accomplishment. Certainly not perfect, but I really never thought they'd get this done.