Just a few days ago, 18 Congresspeople led by Rep. Marcy Kaptur, D-Ohio, called for a criminal investigation of Goldman Sachs. That number has now swollen to 44, including Bart Stupak!

The Obama administration is infested with people with ties to Goldman Sachs and Goldman was Obama’s biggest campaign contributor in 2008 and as a senator. So how real is the Obama/Democratic party’s supposed new toughness on big banks?

I completely agree with Matt on all of this, even right down to his choice of Elizabeth Warren as the candidate of choice. Progressives can’t keep supporting candidates who are in the pocket of Wall Street and our most prosperous and powerful industries. Frankly, it is the historical role of Republicans to do that. The Democratic Party is supposed to be about the people. Right now, it is not. It always puts Wall Street first. We need to cleanse it somehow. We may need to defeat it in order to cleanse it, even if that means opening the way for Republicans again.

Matt knows about the risk of a challenge to Obama resulting in a Republican win, but he argues, and I agree, that we really have no choice. The Party as it is now is no good to progressives or the American people. Running a candidate like Elizabeth Warren will deliver a needed shock to which the Party will either adjust or open the way for a new Party to represent the people against the interests once again. Matt Taibbi talks about the possibility of waiting two or three election cycles until we can be successful at recapturing the party. I hope it doesn’t take that long. But whether it does or not we just can’t let the corporatists run the Democratic Party any more. If we do, our democracy will become a plutocracy. And the American dream will be gone.

Bertha Lewis describes two actions ACORN took today to disrupt the auctions of foreclosed homes in Baltimore and Washington, DC, while describing the reasoning behind ACORN’s emphasis on civil disobedience.