Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein feels bad about crashing our economy. To make up for it, he's said he's sorry and has decided to give back $500 million of the money his company has made to small businesses.

It's a gesture so empty, it's insulting. Never mind that $500m is one good day of trading for Goldman Sachs. Never mind that it's less than 1% of what they got in taxpayer-funded assistance; or that it doesn't even compare to the $11.4 billion they paid themselves in the first half of 2009 alone.

What's really insulting is that it doesn't even begin to undo the damage Goldman Sachs has done to small businesses - like the Stella D'Oro bakery - in the last two years: http://action.seiu.org/helpstella

Yesterday, Lloyd Blankfein said he's committed to job creation. He should tell that to the 150 Stella D'Oro workers in New York who lost their jobs when a Goldman Sachs-owned company bought the business and shut it down. The workers, whose tax dollars bailed out Goldman, have tried to meet with Lloyd Blankfein repeatedly. They wanted to show him the harm he was doing to their already struggling community.

He didn't listen. Maybe we can get his attention. Will you call Goldman Sachs and ask them to use the tax dollars we gave him to help the workers at Stella D'Oro? http://action.seiu.org/helpstella

We gave Goldman Sachs $63 billion of our tax dollars so they could clean up the economic mess they created. But they've only made it worse. Call Goldman Sachs and tell them to stop with the PR stunts and start helping Stella D'Oro workers and all the small businesses they've forced under: http://action.seiu.org/helpstella

Bank of America has a new excuse for why they haven't found someone to replace ousted CEO Ken Lewis. Nobody will take the job because it doesn't pay enough! They are, presumably with a straight face, claiming that they can't find talented candidates because of the pay restrictions put into place by Kenneth Feinberg, whom President Obama recently appointed to review compensation packages for bailed out banks.

And what, exactly, are the limits that Feinberg imposed on exec compensation for BofA? Well, so long as the bank continues to use our tax dollars to finance itself, the top 13 executives at the bank will have to fight over a pot of just - wait for it - $78.6 million. That works out to an average pay of $6 million per executive. If you are wondering, that's $16,438 per day - or a little more than 145 times what the average worker in this country makes. (For comparison, brain surgeons average about $450,000 per year and the President of the United States makes $400,000.)

Are we really expected to believe that Bank of America can't find a single competent individual ready to take on the challenge of reversing the failed course BofA has taken - for $6 million per year? Of course, that's not what's happening. What's happening is more business as usual for the big bank. According to news reports, the candidates they're trying to court include some of the top executives at other giant financial firms - the very same people who helped BofA drive us into economic crisis.

What Bank of America needs to do is expand its search to find a CEO who will care more about the families that bank with them than the number of zeroes on their paycheck. Someone who, as Andy Stern put it yesterday, can put country over company, while our economy struggles. It seems to me that the very modest pay restrictions in place on bailed out banks should be helping them do just that.

We need to tell Bank of America to stop with the tired excuses and choose a CEO that will use the tax dollars we're giving them to get our country back on track. Tell them to start lending to small businesses again. Tell them to stop foreclosing on the homes of struggling families. And tell them to never, ever hire another CEO like Ken Lewis that puts Wall Street profits ahead of Main Street families. Click here to take action: http://action.seiu.org/newceo

The Ken Lewis horror story may be in its final chapter, but it isn't over yet.

Today, newspapers are reporting that the scene inside Bank of America HQ is chaotic. Lewis' sudden ousting caught them off guard - and the man responsible for finding a new CEO cannot be reached because he's "on vacation on a ship" until the end of the month.

Since it's our tax dollars being pumped into BofA, we decided to help with the hiring process. Click here to see the 'help wanted' ad we've placed today: http://action.seiu.org/newceo

The frenzy inside BofA right now isn't new. It's part of the same failed leadership and poor decision making that drove our country into economic turmoil. And it's the exact opposite of what we need in Bank of America's next CEO.

Let's send a clear message to BofA. Stop foreclosing homes. Start lending money again. And no more Ken Lewises: http://action.seiu.org/newceo

I have been going to church for many, many years. And, I have to say, this is not something I've ever heard preached from the pulpit before.

Bloomberg reports that, last night, executives from the big banks went to churches across London to spread the word that their billion dollar bonuses are actually inspired by biblical teachings. According to Goldman Sachs bigwig Brian Griffiths, Jesus' teachings were an "endorsement of self-interest." He went on to say, "we have to tolerate the inequality as a way to achieving greater prosperity and opportunity for all."

The term "inequality" doesn't even begin to describe the situation, though. Wall Street banks - Goldman Sachs included - are still paying out record bonuses in the billions of dollars. In fact, Goldman CEO Lloyd Blankfein was one of the highest paid executives in the country last year. All this while millions of Americans are filing for bankruptcy, foreclosures are at record high rates, and unemployment has skyrocketed - largely due to the risky behaviors of these big banks.

That's not just inequality, that's injustice.

I don't pretend to be an expert on religious teachings; and I wouldn't dare presume to know what Jesus thinks of Wall Street's behavior. I want, instead, to post a few Bible passages that address this subject directly:

35 ' If one of your brethren becomes poor, and falls into poverty among you, then you shall help him, like a stranger or a sojourner, that he may live with you.
36 'Take no usury or interest from him; but fear your God, that your brother may live with you.
37 'You shall not lend him your money for usury, nor lend him your food at a profit. (Leviticus 25:35-37)

17 Who has withdrawn his hand from the poor And not received usury or increase, But has executed My judgments And walked in My statutes -- He shall not die for the iniquity of his father; He shall surely live! (Ezekiel 18:17)

10 "I also, with my brethren and my servants, am lending them money and grain. Please, let us stop this usury!
11 "Restore now to them, even this day, their lands, their vineyards, their olive groves, and their houses, also a hundredth of the money and the grain, the new wine and the oil, that you have charged them." (Nehemiah 5:10,11)

It's up to us, regardless of our faith, to decide if we want to live in a country that allows this behavior to continue.

Thanks to the working Americans who funded the banks' bailouts, banking giants and CEOs were able to get up, brush themselves off, and walk away from the financial crisis relatively unscathed. It is in no way acceptable, however, that their version of 'jumping back into the saddle' means continuing to pay out big figure bonuses to the architects of our economic collapse. Recent data from eFinancialCareers.com shows that financial professionals still think that the middle class should still be taking it on the chin to pad their pockets:

According to the survey, 83 percent of Wall Street professionals expect to receive bonuses this year, and one-third expect to receive even bigger bonuses than they did in 2008.

"You can't change 200 years of history overnight," said John Benson, founder and CEO of eFinancialCareers.com. "...Changing the pay structure is going to be an iterative process, because there are always unintended consequences to every change."

Although just over half of the 1,074 financial services professionals who participated in the survey noted their firms have revised bonus policies, most respondents said the attitudes towards the extreme risk taking that got us here in the first place hasn't changed. After all, why should bankers do things any differently when there is nothing to discourage their behavior? The typical worker has seen their 401k go down 24.3 percent, but Wall Street bonuses remain bigger than ever. The phrase "undeserved entitlement" comes to mind, to say the least.

It's time to end the notion of "too big to fail."

McClatchy Newspapers has launched a multi-part exposé on financial giant Goldman Sachs and their role in the economic collapse. For the millions of Americans who - until recently - had never heard of Goldman Sachs, let alone done business with them, it's a sobering look at how the banking leviathan has managed to take our money from us six ways to Sunday.

Yesterday's article from McClatchy looks at why Goldman, above all others, seemed to walk away from the financial crisis relatively unscathed. What they find isn't particularly new information: Goldman Sachs was buying up dangerously lax mortgage agreements with one hand, and placing bets that they would fail with the other.

That's just the tip of the iceberg, though. According to McClatchy, Goldman Sachs:

• Bought and converted into high-yield bonds tens of thousands of mortgages from subprime lenders that became the subjects of FBI investigations into whether they'd misled borrowers or exaggerated applicants' incomes to justify making hefty loans.


• Used offshore tax havens to shuffle its mortgage-backed securities to institutions worldwide, including European and Asian banks, often in secret deals run through the Cayman Islands, a British territory in the Caribbean that companies use to bypass U.S. disclosure requirements.


• Has dispatched lawyers across the country to repossess homes from bankrupt or financially struggling individuals, many of whom lacked sufficient credit or income but got subprime mortgages anyway because Wall Street made it easy for them to qualify.


• Was buoyed last fall by key federal bailout decisions, at least two of which involved then-Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, a former Goldman chief executive whose staff at Treasury included several other Goldman alumni.

[emphasis mine]

On its own, it's infuriating. They didn't just find the loopholes, they created them to make sure they never had to face the consequences of their actions. But, what's really upsetting is reading about how millions of unsuspecting Americans got caught up in Goldman's financial shell game. From today's McClatchy piece:

Goldman spent years buying hundreds of thousands of subprime mortgages, many of them from some of the more unsavory lenders in the business, and packaging them into high-yield bonds. Now that the bottom has fallen out of that market, Goldman finds itself in a different role: as the big banker that takes homes away from folks such as the Beckers.

[The Becker family of California] alleges that Goldman declined for three years to confirm their suspicions that it had bought their mortgages from a subprime lender, even after they wrote to Goldman's then-Chief Executive Henry Paulson - later U.S. Treasury secretary - in 2003.

Unable to identify a lender, the couple could neither capitalize on a mortgage hardship provision that would allow them to defer some payments, nor on a state law enabling them to offset their debt against separate, investment-related claims against Goldman.

[emphasis mine]

Goldman is now employing the same tricks they used gaming the financial system to dupe working families. These are families that never signed a single contract with Goldman Sachs, but watched their financial future bought and sold up the banking food chain until it reached Goldman as nothing more than one cell of data in a massive spreadsheet.

Of course, each cell of that spreadsheet is actually a person. And each one of those people has a life story. And as we speak, those stories are being drastically rewritten by Goldman Sachs and their cronies on Wall Street.

For millions of families, the ending is not going to be a happy one.

Last week, we learned that the swift action by the President and Congress to pass an economic recovery package earlier this year helped stave off a global economic recession, put our economy back on the path of growth, and helped save hundreds of thousands of jobs.

SEIU was a major proponent of the economic recovery package and we believe we need to continue to make progress on a number of other economic initiatives to build long-term sustainable economic growth--these include passing meaningful financial reform, investing in green jobs, using public pension funds to build a 21st century infrastructure, and creating a new retirement system to protect our future.

Passing Meaningful Financial Reform
Anna Burger writes on New Deal 2.0 about the need to fundamentally change the way we value wealth and work in our country and act now on meaningful reforms to protect our families from future economic crises.

To build long-term economic progress we must:

• Create a strong Consumer Financial Protection Agency to serve as a watchdog against predatory and reckless banking products;
• Crackdown on out of control executive pay that rewards short term risks over long term results;
• End too big to fail once and for all by separating commercial banking from investment banking and raising capital requirements back to levels that promote safe and sound banks;
• Empower shareholders to act on executive pay and break the excessive power of executive-controlled boards;
• Force banks to expand lending to small businesses and state and local governments to create jobs and save critical services;
• Demand banks stop foreclosures and help families keep their homes;
• Reregulate the shadow financial markets--including derivatives, hedge funds and private equity; and
• Investigate, and if necessary prosecute, the big banks and Wall Street for crashing our economy.

In case you missed it--more than 5,000 Americans from 20 states--converged on the American Bankers Association convention in Chicago to demand banks stop fighting reforms that would help protect our families from future crises. It was the beginning of a national movement to hold banks and Wall Street accountable for their reckless behavior.

Investing in Green Jobs
During the first meeting of the President's Economic Recovery Board, Anna Burger shared her perspective on how business, labor and government can work together towards creating a low-carbon, green economy and a movement into sustainable good, green jobs--citing the work SEIU and other Change to Win unions are already doing on the community and national level to lead the way on green initiatives.

While thousands of Americans were delivering a letter to Goldman Sachs on Sunday demanding they stop using our tax dollars to lobby against financial reform, Goldman Sachs was ...using our tax dollars to lobby against financial reform.

Matt Taibbi has an excellent find on his blog at True/Slant about a Goldman Sachs lobbying document being circulated to US senators right now. From the document (via Taibbi's blog):

"ALTERNATIVE TRADING PLATFORMS AND THEIR EFFECT ON LIQUIDITY

The equity markets provide perhaps the best example of a highly evolved complex ecosystem, where care must be taken to preserve the benefits that have evolved from competition and innovation...

Crucially, liquidity is what helps to solve this mismatch problem. Market makers that see large volumes are best positioned to match differing size transactions. In traditional exchange trading, bids and offers are public, and this transparency helps buyers and sellers to achieve the best price.

For some market participants, however, the openness and transparency of the equity market actually mean they are unlikely to achieve the best price. The risk, particularly for large transactions such as those undertaken by pension funds or large mutual funds (where most small investors have most of their equity exposure), is that other market participants will use this transparency to undercut the intended transactions."

From a Goldman Sachs lobbying document (emphasis mine)

This is... wow. Take a minute to soak this up. The big banks are arguing that allowing for openness and transparency would be bad for the shadow markets they've created, because it might cause them to make less money on each trade. Currently, they trade stocks in something they've termed "dark pools." Dark pools are a creative accounting trick to sell large amounts of stock to people without having to disclose to them the risk of their stock's value plummeting.

Most reasonable people get uncomfortable just hearing the term "dark pools." But, the Wall Street bankers love them. Because, while they create losses for most of the people involved, the folks at the top clean up nicely on these deals. Sort of like how pyramid scams work.

This is the exact type of behavior the fueled the economic collapse. It's still going on as we speak. And here's the worst part: banks are using the money that they got from bailouts to help fund the entire scheme.

My apologies if I just spoiled your appetite before lunch.

It was a sad day for corporations in the financial, insurance, and real estate sector--like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce & the Financial Services Roundtable--who spent a combined total of $321 million lobbying against federal reforms such as limits on bonuses and the creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Agency (CFPA). These groups were concerned that oversight legislation to help rein in greed on Wall Street might actually....rein in greed on Wall Street. "We remain concerned that this legislation will have significant and harmful unintended consequences for consumers, businesses, and the overall economy," the groups wrote in a letter to House members last week.

Thankfully, the House Financial Services Committee didn't feel nearly as sympathetic towards the creators of unfair financial products that scam consumers and taxpayers as they feel for themselves. A recent poll found that nearly 75 percent of Americans believe that the greed and risky decisions of banks and financial companies led to our financial crisis--and our lawmakers agree. Yesterday, the House voted 39 to 29 to move forward with the creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Agency, to help put a stop to the dangerous and deceptive products and practices that got us into this mess. The House Financial Services Committee also approved legislation that would impose new rules for credit cards by Dec. 1, moving up the date from mid-February. Democratic supporters said moving up the date was necessary because lenders were using the grace period to hike interest rates.

The American Bankers Association joined the Chamber of Commerce in expressing their disapproval for the legislation, saying it would continue to try to make its case against the agency as the legislation moves to the House floor in coming weeks and, eventually, to the Senate. "We still have major concerns with some principal areas" including "the very broad, ill-defined authority that is granted to this new agency that could be used to justify essentially any regulatory action," said Floyd Stoner, ABA vice president for congressional relations.

Creating the CFPA as part of Obama's broader plan to clamp down on Wall Street is an important step towards preventing much of the reckless lending that contributed to last year's near-collapse of the market. "It's been a year since the financial world collapsed and it is now clear that the greed and excess of big banks, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and their allies could have and should have been prevented," said SEIU's Anna Burger. "Chairman Frank and the Financial Services Committee stood up on behalf of American families by passing legislation to create a strong Consumer Financial Protection Agency--and to prevent business as usual to continue."

According to a recent poll, nearly 75 percent of Americans believe that the greed and risky decisions of banks and financial companies led to our financial crisis.And there's much more to be done. We believe that to be successful, the CFPA must be strengthened to include:

• oversight of auto dealers who receive lucrative compensation in financing auto loans;
• the authority to examine the books of all financial institutions, no matter what size, without cumbersome barriers;
• fixes to the current compensation system which pressures and incentivizes workers to push and sell bad and unneeded products to consumers as a condition of employment; and
• the full authority to stop the sale of credit-related insurance policies that are virtually worthless.

That's why when the American Bankers Association meets in Chicago next week, more than 5,000 taxpayers from 20 states will be there to demand an end to Wall Street's appetite for greed.

Did you know you're throwing a party this weekend? Well, you're paying for it but you're not invited.

It's the American Bankers Association (ABA) conference in Chicago. The ABA is the lobbying group that gets millions of our tax dollars from America's bailed out banks.

Here are some of the highlights for their meeting:

• a luxurious riverboat cruise
• a historical mansion tour
• a roaring 1920s big band gala
• celebrity appearances by Newt Gingrich & George Will

With all the fun on our dime, it seems like the big bankers should at least set aside some time to meet with taxpayers! Click here to demand a meeting: http://action.seiu.org/bankparty

Gathering outside the ABA conference will be more than 5,000 taxpayers from all over the US. All we're asking for is a meeting with the banks. We want to tell them to stop using our money to lobby against financial reform. Before we go, though, we're delivering to the ABA signatures from taxpayers across the country, asking them to meet with us.

Add your name here: http://action.seiu.org/bankparty

This is going to be the largest protest against bank greed since the financial meltdown began. Even if you can't be in Chicago, will you make yourself a part of it? http://action.seiu.org/bankparty

Paul Krugman gives a sobering report on the state of banks in today's New York Times. We already know that while giant financial institutions are paying out record bonuses and salaries, they aren't lending to small businesses or helping families that are struggling with their mortgages. But, now, it seems the risky deals Wall Street has been making with our tax dollars are catching up to them - and they're starting to generate losses instead of profits. All of this combined, says Krugman, is having serious negative effects on the economy:

...[L]ast week both Citi and BofA announced losses in the third quarter. What happened?

Part of the answer is that those earlier profits were in part a figment of the accountants' imaginations. More broadly, however, we're looking at payback from the real economy. In the first phase of the crisis, Main Street was punished for Wall Street's misdeeds; now broad economic distress, especially persistent high unemployment, is leading to big losses on mortgage loans and credit cards.

And here's the thing: The continuing weakness of many banks is helping to perpetuate that economic distress. Banks remain reluctant to lend, and tight credit, especially for small businesses, stands in the way of the strong recovery we need.

It's become apparent that nobody knows exactly what banks are doing with the tax dollars we gave them, but the picture is becoming clearer: Wall Street CEOs are collecting huge bonuses for making risky trades, banks are funneling millions of dollars through the ABA to lobby against financial reform, but small businesses and working families are still being denied loans.

This is the opposite of how banks were supposed to use our tax dollars and they know it. It's become clear that they can't control themselves; Krugman suggests we do it for them:

...[W]e desperately need to pass effective financial reform. For if we don't, bankers will soon be taking even bigger risks than they did in the run-up to this crisis. After all, the lesson from the last few months has been very clear: When bankers gamble with other people's money, it's heads they win, tails the rest of us lose.

This weekend, the banks will be in Chicago, partying it up at the annual ABA convention. Thousands of taxpayers are going to meet them there, demanding that they stop using our money to lobby against reform and start cleaning up the economic mess they've created.

Will you demand that the banks meet with us? We're going to deliver your demands to the banks before we arrive and ask them to sit down and listen to Americans tell about how banks have damaged their communities.

With your help, we can put an end to business as usual on Wall Street.

UPDATE, 1:00 p.m.: Anna has given her testimony before the Committee -- stay tuned for video of that testimony.

SEIU International Secretary-Treasurer Anna Burger will testify before the House Financial Services Committee this morning at a hearing on the Consumer Financial Protection Agency. You can watch the hearing "Perspectives on the Consumer Financial Protection Agency" online now here.

Others giving testimony today along with Anna include:

• Mr. Hilary O. Shelton, President of the Center for Responsible Lending
  
• Mr. Michael Calhoun, President and Chief Operating Officer, Center for Responsible Lending 
  
• Mr. David C. John, Senior Research Fellow, Thomas A. Roe Institute for Economic Policy Studies, The Heritage Foundation
  
• Ms. Janis Bowdler, Senior Policy Analyst, National Council of La Raza
  
• Mr. R. Michael S. Menzies, Sr., President and Chief Executive Officer, Easton Bank and Trust Co. on behalf of the Independent Community Bankers of America
  
• Mr. Andrew J. Pincus, Partner, Mayer Brown LLP on behalf of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce
  
• Mr. Edward L. Yingling, President and Chief Executive Officer, American Bankers Association
  
• Mr. Bill Himpler, Executive Vice President, American Financial Services Association

Anna's remarks to the Committee after the break. Watch here--Anna should be speaking shortly before 11:00 a.m.

On the eve of the first G-20 summit since the global financial collapse, SEIU has a new report measuring the severe impact the economic crisis has had on working families. The report breaks down not just the cost of the bailouts, but also the (much, much bigger) associated costs that came along with them.

Here are some of the astounding highlights:

• Taxpayers have committed $4.7 trillion to the financial sector over the last year--only $700 billion of that $4.7 trillion was through TARP.
• The bank-induced economic crisis has cost American families $11 trillion in wealth in 2008, nearly 18% of their net worth.
• Americans have lost $6.1 trillion in homeowner wealth since June 2006.

Even banks like Goldman Sachs that returned their TARP funds earlier this year continue to benefit from other bailout programs, such as the $12.9 billion that Goldman received as an AIG counterparty that it will never have to pay back.

Meanwhile, banks continue to...

• Pay themselves millions in bonuses: the nation's top six banks paid out $31.2 billion in bonuses this past winter.
  
• Set aside $$ for future bonuses. In the first half of 2009 alone, banks set aside another $74.4 billion for bonuses and compensation--an amount alone that would solve the budget shortfalls in 15 states, including California.
  
• Make excessive profits on the backs of consumers: banks continue behaviors such as refusing to modify mortgages to prevent foreclosures and reducing their small business lending--they actually now give out less money than they did before their TARP infusion.
  
• Gouge us on overdraft fees. Americans will pay more than $38 billion in overdraft fees alone in 2009, more than $125 for every man, woman, and child in the United States.

The worst part? Big banks and other financial institutions aren't merely back to their old tricks and the same practices that caused the crisis in the first place--they're actually standing in the way of real reform that would protect consumers and prevent a future crisis.

Companies in the financial, insurance, and real estate sector spent $321 million lobbying against federal reforms such as:

• The creation of the Consumer Financial Protection Agency
  
• Limits on bonuses
  
• Loan modification proposals that could help keep millions of Americans in their homes,
  
• And the Employee Free Choice Act--which would provide a much-needed check on corporate power by giving workers a real voice in the workplace.

Read and download the report here:

Trillion Dollar Bank Job -

"We now understand that the actions of a small group of greedy CEOs and Wall Street investors can wreak havoc on the global economy, yet we still haven't taken the necessary steps to prevent a future crisis," said SEIU Secretary-Treasurer Anna Burger at a briefing to release the report. At noon tomorrow, outside a secret meeting of the Financial Services Roundtable at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Washington, D.C., workers and community groups will kick off a month of actions in more than two dozen cities across the country.

Download the report here: The Trillion Dollar Bank Job: How Wall Street and the Big Banks Are Holding Up America's Economic Recovery.

"When Lehman Brothers fell, they took not just the rest of Wall Street, but all of Main Street, down with them. Yet, one year later, the greedy CEOs who caused the collapse are unremorseful, unrepentant, and virtually unchanged," said SEIU Secretary-Treasurer Anna Burger, following President Obama's speech yesterday on the anniversary of the collapse of Lehman Brothers. While the economy continues to recover, President Obama warned, "normalcy cannot lead to complacency."

Watch President Obama's speech yesterday from Wall Street's Federal Hall:

'Business as Usual'?

"You'd think that the collapse of over 90 banks in one year alone would be a powerful 'lesson learned' for the titans at big financial houses, but on Wall Street, it's back to 'business as usual,' said Burger. After bailing out banks to the tune of $4.7 trillion following the financial collapse, American taxpayers were then hit with the hidden costs of our bank-induced recession: foreclosures, unemployment and bankruptcies.

Now the big banks and financial corporations are hitting us a third time, by lobbying against meaningful reforms that could prevent a repeat of the crisis in the future.The U.S. Chamber of Commerce's Tom Donohue and his CEO allies might not think so, but America can't afford their reckless and selfish behavior any longer.

The current regulatory framework simply doesn't provide adequate protection to consumers--we need Congress to reform our financial system, fund strict enforcement of the rules, and give long term shareholders the power they need to reign in the out-of-control corporate elite. Let's stop this cycle before more jobs are lost, more homes are foreclosed, and more retirement accounts are wiped out. Don't let the U.S. Chamber and Big Banks delay consumer protection any longer.

UPDATE: Transcript from the President's address from Wall Street can be found here. Watch his address on the first anniversary of the Lehman Brothers collapse here:

The President is on Wall Street today, pushing for Change. A year after the collapse at Lehman Brothers and the worldwide financial collapse, President Obama will speak from Wall Street's Federal Hall in New York about the government's role in moving the economy forward after the financial crisis that peaked one year ago. Obama will focus on how to protect consumer's money by enacting stricter regulations of the financial and banking industry to prevent another financial collapse.

The livestream from the speech at Federal Hall begins at 12:10 p.m. ET and 9:10 a.m. PT today. Tune in to watch it here:

Leave your thoughts on the President's speech in the 'comments' section below.