Jeff Gelles: Big finance boosting its political gifts

As he touted his latest idea for home refinancing, aimed at helping up-to-date homeowners benefit from low interest rates even if the value of a home has fallen, President Obama showed off a simplified mortgage-disclosure form - one of the initial goals of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau he championed.

"This is what a mortgage form should look like," Obama said, recalling the difficulty that he and his wife, Michelle, faced - even as newly trained lawyers - in parsing papers presented to them when they bought their first condo.

Simplifying mortgage-disclosure documents is part of the nuts-and-bolts of consumer protection. If that wasn't obvious before the housing bubble and financial crisis, it was painfully so afterward, when we learned how the mess was triggered in large part by exotic and confusing loans that weren't in anybody's interests - except that of lenders or loan brokers who sold them immediately and never had to worry about the micro- or macroeconomic risks of defaults.

In its first six months on the job, the CFPB has pursued similarly basic goals for those who borrow via credit cards or student loans. It has built a user-friendly website (www.consumerfinance.gov) to help educate consumers about financial products and their risks, and established a central place where borrowers can direct complaints if something goes wrong. It has helped thousands of consumers win relief - and helped thousands of others understand why a lender was sticking to its guns. It is working to help seniors, military families, payday-loan borrowers, and others at extra risk of confusion or scams.

So why did blocking the CFPB's start-up become a rallying cry for virtually every Republican in the U.S. Senate? Why did they choose to filibuster the nomination of Obama's choice to head the agency, former Ohio Attorney General Richard Cordray, and demand that the Dodd-Frank financial reforms be weakened before they took effect?

For that matter, why did some Democrats seem so cozy during the Dodd-Frank debates with a financial industry whose unwise risks almost triggered Great Depression 2.0?

It's impossible to say for sure what motivates anyone. But a new report on the growth of big money in politics suggests that something beyond a simple difference in ideology may be at play.