“Know Your Customer” Regulation Withdrawn . . .After being overwhelmed by more than 140,000 complaints, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) has announced that the controversial “Know Your Customer” regulations will be withdrawn as of March 4, 1999. The three other bank regulators (Comptroller of the Currency, Federal Reserve System, and the Office of Thrift Supervision) have indicated that they will withdraw the regulation by March 8th, the deadline for airing comments on the proposal. The controversial “Know Your Customer” regulation would have required banks to monitor their customers’ accounts, keep customer profiles, and report suspicious activity to federal law enforcers. John D. Hawke, Jr., comptroller of the currency, stated that although the proposed regulation was intended to combat money laundering schemes by drug lords and criminals, “it inadvertently undermined confidence in the banking system by violating the traditionally confidential relationship between banks and their customers.” This regulation “assumes that every bank customer is guilty until proven innocent,” said Gregory T. Nojeim, legislative counsel for the ACLU. Richard A. Small, an assistant director at the Federal Reserve, said that the public outcry over this proposal, from individual citizens, small business groups, community banks, civil libertarians, and pro-family groups, was “unprecedented”. And the resultant withdrawal of this regulation is a rare move by the nation’s powerful banking agencies. [The Washington Times, 3/5/99] “Know Your Customer” Dealt a Second Blow . . . On the same day that “Know Your Customer” was killed by the FDIC, the regulation was dealt a second blow from the House Committee on Banking and Financial Services. During committee work on a financial modernization bill, (HR 10), the banking committee unanimously approved Rep. Barr’s (R-GA) amendment to stop the “Know Your Customer” regulation. Rep. Barr’s amendment passed as a substitute for an amendment originally offered by Rep. Paul (R-TX), which would have not only stopped the “Know Your Customer” regulation, but would have also removed the ability of regulators to ever make such a rule. Barr’s substitute amendment only applies to the currently proposed “Know Your Customer” regulations. After the vote was taken, Rep. Paul said, “[T]his is a true victory for our side, those who cherish liberty. While we should not recklessly assume the regulators will give up their hopes of ‘Know Your Customer’ – style invasions on privacy, they have been dealt a serious blow.” [ScanThisNews, 3/4/99] “Know Your Customer” Dealt a Third Blow . . . On March 5th, the U.S. Senate, by a vote of 88-0, passed a resolution directing bank regulators to drop the “Know Your Customer” regulation. Sen. Gramm (R-TX) said, “This is such a broad-reaching regulation that it infringes on our constitutional rights.” Corporations Stop Funding Planned Parenthood . . .According to Life Decisions International (LDI), the fifty-sixth and fifty-seventh corporation has been removed from LDI’s Planned Parenthood Boycott List! Both corporations, Peter Kiewit & Sons, Inc. (56th) and General Mills, Inc. (57th) will no longer fund Planned Parenthood. This is a great victory for the pro-life community who have joined with LDI to make this happen. Life Decisions International (LDI) is an organization dedicated to ending Planned Parenthood’s corporate and public funding as well as their world wide influence. For a list of corporate supporters of Planned Parenthood, including their products, services, subsidiaries, names of chief executive officers, phone numbers, addresses and information about the boycott, please send a $10 donation to LDI, P.O. Box 907, Washington, D.C., 20044-0907. Phone: (202) 347-2066. Continue to pray for the work LDI is doing!United Nations” “Cairo+5” Conference . . .The “Cairo+5” Conference, involving the United Nations, the Clinton Administration, and the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF) has been organized for the purpose of aggressively implementing the radical “family planning” and “sexuality” agenda formulated at the 1994 United Nations International Conference on Population and Development held in Cairo, Egypt. Five years after the Cairo conference, organizers feel that the 1994 agenda has not moved forward aggressively enough. March 22-30, 1999, a pre-conference meeting (prepcom) will be held at U.N. headquarters in New York City to produce a major document that will be discussed and voted on by the U.N. General Assembly in July, 1999. The agenda proposed by these U.N. conferences do not just affect children in other countries, but the U.N. agenda is being aggressively implemented in the United States, too. The 1994 Cairo agenda was already extreme, but new and more dangerous ideas are being considered for the Cairo+5 agenda. Such as: 1) defining abortion as a “basic human right”; 2) teaching young people that homosexuality and lesbianism are normal lifestyles; and 3) granting children as young as 10 total legal freedom and privacy when it comes to sexual activity. Concerned Women for America (CWA) as well as other pro-family groups from around the world are planning to attend the New York meeting in an effort to argue forcefully against the anti-family, anti-life views of IPPF and it allies. Pro-family forces must try to influence the final document that will be voted on in July and show the delegates that millions of American women and men believe that abortion, forced sterilization and “sexual rights” for young people are wrong. Please pray for the upcoming pre-conference and the many pro-family groups attending. If you are able, financially support those groups who are “standing in the gap” to represent biblical perspectives. [Concerned Women for America, 3/99] |