After a towing company hauled Justin Kurtz’s car from his apartment complex parking lot, despite his permit to park there, Mr. Kurtz, 21, a college student in Kalamazoo, Mich., went to the Internet for revenge.

The Obama administration is no longer insisting on the creation of a stand-alone consumer protection agency as a central element of the plan to remake regulation of the financial system.

Congressional Democrats and the White House are softening some elements of the Obama administration's proposal to overhaul financial-market supervision as they begin a push to win broader support for the bill.

Consumer affairs columnist George Gombossy has worked for the Hartford Courant since 1969—longer than most Consumerist readers have been alive. Yesterday was his last day at the paper, but he wasn't caught up in one of the rounds of buyouts and layoffs hitting the newspaper industry. Gombossy claims that he was "was fired for doing [his] job," after his last column exposed the bedbug-infested mattresses sold by a major Courant advertiser.

The consumer movement is at a crossroads. After becoming a force in the 1960s with Nader's rise to prominence, it has since struggled to connect with the media and public.

The White House is working to enact a wide array of federal regulations, many of which would weaken government rules aimed at protecting consumers and the environment, before President Bush leaves office in January.

Bush administration officials, in their last weeks in office, are pushing to rewrite a wide array of federal rules with changes or additions that could block product-safety lawsuits by consumers and states.

Arcane Federal Reserve Board regulations don't typically generate outpourings of emotion from consumers. But its proposals to curb the most egregious abuses by credit card issuers drew a record 56,000 comments.

As subprime mortgages continue to demonstrate the damage to borrowers and the economy when risky loans are made to sometimes unsophisticated consumers, politicians who once steered clear of limiting the availability of credit now find "fair lending" laws that cap interest rates more palatable.

The biggest overhaul of U.S. product-safety rules in a generation cleared a major hurdle Monday, making it likely Congress will impose stricter regulation of everything from toys to all-terrain vehicles -- along with harsher penalties for companies that violate the regulations.

Letitia Youngblood struggled through repairs, government paperwork and shady contractors to rebuild her home after Hurricane Katrina. Then her mortgage payments recently jumped 35%.

Senior Treasury officials identified three immediate targets yesterday for their plan to overhaul the nation's financial regulatory structure, including streamlining the approval process for securities that contributed to the crisis now roiling Wall Street.

The chair of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), Deborah Platt Majoras, is leaving her job. She's going to become vice president and general counsel for Procter & Gamble (P&G).

A long-running federal investigation into the orthopedic device industry’s suspected kickback payments to hip and knee surgeons now has the doctors in the spotlight.

[C]olleges could do a far better job of teaching personal finance, disclosing the terms of exclusive deals with banks and making students aware of possible lower-cost alternatives.

Since 2001, nearly half of all federal inspections of facilities that package fresh spinach revealed serious sanitary problems, but the Food and Drug Administration did not take "meaningful" enforcement action, a House committee report released yesterday found.

When companies are sued for selling unsafe consumer products or creating environmental hazards, the cases too often end with court orders that keep vital health and safety dangers secret.

The net of regulations and inspections that is supposed to ensure food safety is fraying to the point of breaking.

Last fall, when children lost consciousness after eating toy beads, parents could not quickly find information about others who had endured the same harrowing ordeal.

In the coming days, the Senate will be tasked with salvaging a badly discredited agency: the Consumer Product Safety Commission.

Hidden fees and surcharges that drive up the cost of everything from phone service to concert tickets are spreading like wildfire, creating a nuisance for U.S. consumers and making truth in billing little more than a hollow promise.

Last year, more than 25 million hazardous playthings -- most of them produced in Chinese factories -- were recalled by U.S. manufacturers and federal regulators.

Politicians and regulators have been slow to wake up to the destructive impact of banks on the rest of society.

Even though predatory lending was becoming a national problem, the Bush administration looked the other way and did nothing to protect American homeowners. In fact, the government chose instead to align itself with the banks that were victimizing consumers.

Big broadband companies are headed for a clash with Washington over whether consumers have a right to get as much as they want from the Internet, as fast as they want it, without paying extra for the privilege.

Dr. Robert Jarvik is best known for the artificial heart he pioneered more than a quarter-century ago. Since then he had toiled in relative obscurity — until he began appearing in television ads two years ago for the Pfizer cholesterol drug Lipitor.

"The nation's plant inspectors will have to watch diseased, infected birds going out to the public," says Felicia Nestor, senior policy analyst for Food & Water Watch.

American consumers endured a nerve-racking 2007. Companies recalled millions of toys containing lead paint or tiny magnets. Regulators were forced to order the recall of one million cribs after three babies strangled because of defective side rails.

When the Consumer Product Safety Commission returns to work on Monday, it will not have the authority to adopt safety rules, order mandatory recalls of dangerous products, or impose civil penalties on companies that do not report product hazards immediately.

The White House is considering a scientist who has frequently testified and written on behalf of the energy, pesticide and tobacco industries to chair the nation's chief product-safety regulator.

Sen. Hillary Clinton is on the defensive for another vote aligned with President Bush early in her legislative career: this one for a measure to make it more difficult to erase personal debts through bankruptcy.

Cleveland is suing 21 of the nation’s largest banks and financial institutions, accusing them of knowingly plunging the city into a financial crisis by flooding the local housing market with subprime mortgage loans to people who could never repay.

This may be the year frustrated airline passengers finally get some relief in the form of a federal bill of rights.

My daughter is a freshman in college and is learning a lot, including how to manage her money. Recently, she got a powerful initiation into the predatory practices of banks -- a lesson more and more of us are learning each month.

Dave Stewart's 72-year-old mother went to Stanford University Medical Center for double knee-replacement surgery in April. Four days later, she was dead.

After a year in which American parents discovered Elmo was tainted with lead, Polly had dangerous magnets in her pockets, and one of this season's most sought-after toys was laced with a coma-inducing chemical, Congress is going home this week without reforming the nation's consumer product safety system.

With the holiday season approaching, there is more bad news about the federal agency charged with protecting children from unsafe toys.

Tens of thousands of Medicare recipients have been victims of deceptive sales tactics and had claims improperly denied by private insurers that run the system’s huge new drug benefit program and offer other private insurance options encouraged by the Bush administration, a review of scores of federal audits has found.