Senator Durbin: "Bankers 'own' the U.S. Congress"

DURBIN: And the banks -- hard to believe in a time when we're facing a banking crisis that many of the banks created -- are still the most powerful lobby on Capitol Hill. And they frankly own the place.

(Dick Durbin is the senior senator from Illinois and is the Democratic Party Whip.)

Glenn Greenwald discusses Durbin's comments in his Salon column -

One might think it would be a big news story for the second most-powerful member of the U.S. Senate to baldly state that the Congress is "owned" by the bankers who spawned the financial crisis and continue to dictate the government's actions. But it won't be. The leading members of the media work for the very corporations that benefit most from this process.

Lots of financial data are available at OpenSecrets.org.