First, the banking lobby in Washington is huge compared to Wal-Mart’s lobby and banks are equal-opportunity givers: the Democrats and Republicans both get heaps of money shoveled at them to stifle real competition in the banking industry; second, although Democrats would have been the “natural” party to support a measure that would surely benefit lower-income citizens, the Democrats have an instinctive hatred of Wal-Mart because it’s non-union.

Thus, greed and ideology once again conspire to deny a real benefit to those at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder. I’m just sayin’.