Congressional Democrats have just caved to Republicans on a tax to make banks pay for their next bailout:

Democrats on Tuesday planned to strip out a controversial tax from their landmark financial reform bill in order to win the swing votes needed to pass it through Congress.

With crucial Republican moderates threatening to withdraw their support, Democrats were weighing alternative ways to fund the most sweeping rewrite of the Wall Street rulebook since the 1930s.

Though a supposedly final version of the bill had been hammered out last week, Democrats in charge of the process called a fresh negotiating session, which got under way shortly after 5 p.m. EDT Tuesday.

Democratic lawmakers and aides said they planned to remove a $17.9 billion tax on large financial institutions. Instead, they would cover most of the bill’s costs by shutting down a $700 billion bank-bailout program.

Except, of course, that the next time that a big bank needs a bailout, they would get one.

Why Dems aren’t using ‘Phants coziness with the banks as a club with which to hit them is beyond me, except, of course, for the fact that President Hopey-Changey wants to have something on his desk soon, even if it sucks wet farts from dead pigeons.

Once again, keep Obama away from toilet paper, because he will sign anything.