U.S. Chamber feels heat from Obama, defectors

On the day he won the Nobel Peace Prize, President Barack Obama took a swing at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

This time, the issue was whether to create the Consumer Financial Protection Agency, which Obama said is needed to “ensure transparency and fair-dealing” in transactions for loans and other financial products. The chamber contends that consumers can be best protected through existing regulators and argues the new agency would make credit more expensive and harder to get.

Obama criticized the chamber Oct. 9 for spending millions on a “completely false” ad campaign that claims “local butchers and other small businesses will somehow be harmed by this agency.”

San Francisco Business Times – by Kent Hoover

Full Story: http://sanfrancisco.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/stories/2009/10/12/daily88.html