The banks have fought their war against financial reform on four fronts.

They have pushed for delays, lobbied allies in Congress to repeal aspects of Dodd-Frank, worked over regulators to make the rules as loose as possible and threatened legal challenges and filed lawsuits.

The battle has been overwhelming, with a scrappy band of pro-reform rebels outnumbered and overpowered by the empire’s resources. The public appears to be on the side of the insurgents, but perhaps can’t follow or understand debates about whether “swaps” — what are those? — should be “pushed out” or not — what’s that? (English translation below.)

During all of these fights, the banks have had a stalwart ally holding back greater reform: Establishment Democrats.

Such Democrats, the Robert E. Rubin wing of the Democratic Party, opposed moves to break up the big banks after the 2008 global crisis. These stalwarts prevented a reinstatement of the…

Banks under assault?? Please…..

We should all do so well while under assault.

JPMorgan Chase earned $4.9 billion in the fourth quarter of 2014, the companyannounced on Wednesday, down from a year ago, but capping what CEO Jamie Dimon called a record year for the biggest U.S. bank by assets.

Despite this success, Dimon warned that “banks are under assault,” from government regulators.

“In the old days,” Dimon said, “you dealt with one regulator when you had an issue, maybe two. “Now it’s five or six. It makes it very difficult and very complicated.

“You all should ask the question about how American that is. And how fair that is,” he added. “And how complex that is for companies.”

Read on.