So today celebrates the ten year anniversary of the repeal of Glass-Steagall, and I hope you’ll all join me in a nice strong martini later and some reminiscing over exactly how well that has worked out in the last year or so. You might also want to join me in sending some diapers to the bank lobbyists, who are currently crapping their pants over the actions of one Representative Paul Kanjorski:

Seven Wall Street lobbyists trooped to Capitol Hill on Nov. 9, hoping to convince Representative Paul Kanjorski’s staff that his plan to dismantle large financial firms was a bad idea.

They walked out with a sobering conclusion, according to the accounts of two attendees who requested anonymity because the meeting was private. Not only was Kanjorski serious, he planned to offer the legislation as early as next week — and it just might pass.

There are a few different ideas, and I’m not going to rank them ‘from worst to first’ because as much as I don’t like the idea of ‘too big to fail’ I am not fond of letting a bunch of politicians reapportion corporations in a way they deem sensible, either, because not much that comes out of Washington is sensible. But here are a few of the ideas, which vest a large amount of power in Timmay, Ben and others:

Representative Barney Frank, chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, has proposed giving the Federal Reserve authority to force holding companies whose size threatens financial stability to sell assets or halt certain activities. Representative Ed Perlmutter, a Colorado Democrat, wants to amend Frank’s bill so that the Fed could impose Glass- Steagall on a case-by-case basis, said his spokeswoman, Leslie Oliver.

Senator Bernie Sanders, a Vermont independent, would give Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner 90 days to come up with a list of banks, hedge funds and insurance companies deemed “too big to fail.” Geithner would have one year to break them up.

I’m no attorney but things like selectively imposing laws just don’t sound good. However, the flip side of the argument – that the best defense the lobbyists can come up with is “we need huge banks so we can stay internationally competitive” – just makes me think of $C and RBS in a footrace to the bottom of a fiery ravine, so I think they’re gonna need to work a lot more round-the-clock days on the Hill to stop one of these plans from coming to fruition.

And just for good measure, here’s Little Britain, “Computer says no”: