Watch: DC's Stockholm Syndrome

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— By Monika Bauerlein

We've been getting emails all weekend from friends, family, MoJo readers, and random strangers about David Corn and Kevin Drum's turn on Bill Moyers' Journal. It was really an astonishingly good show, and well worth watching in the context of... just about everything happening in Washington right now. Take your pick: Today, there's a kerfuffle about the shadow of the possibility of a financial transaction fee, a tiny amount the government could collect from banks to get a little something back for taxpayers--or, more to the point, for our children, who will be paying for the deficit we ran up for the bailout. (Yes, some banks are repaying TARP money, but do you know just how tiny fraction of the total bailout that is? Our handy chart, along with lots more data geekery on shameless bonuses and such, is here. The "Too Big to Jail" package that inspired Moyers to ask Kevin and David to come on is here.) As with every other proposal to make Big Finance bear any part of the burden for the disaster it has caused, this won't fly unless politicians feel they have more to lose from satisfying Wall Street than they do from offending it.

watch the show here

link