Why does the bank lobby and the politicians in its pocket feel so threatened by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau?

With the July 21 deadline for the official launch of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau looming, the bank lobby and the politicians in its pocket are ramping up their attacks on the Oklahoma-born Harvard law professor who first came up with the idea for the bureau: Elizabeth Warren. A key element of the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial reform legislation, the CFPB’s stated mission is to make it easier for consumers to understand financial fine print. So why are the bankers so scared?

In this Nation Conversation with managing editor Roane Carey, Ari Berman explains that Warren poses such a threat to the predatory financial industry because she’s a populist academic who can explain her ideas in commonsense language. For more on Warren and the fight to make the CFPB a reality, read Berman’s article in this week’s issue of The Nation.