The Senate banking committee took a step backward today with its approval of the Financial Regulatory Improvement Act. This legislation is fundamentally misconceived: while its proponents claim to be focused on the needs of small community banks, the substance of the bill reads more like a deregulatory wish list for big banks and other large financial players.

Even if some on Capitol Hill appear to have forgotten the lessons of the financial crisis, the rest of the country has not. The great majority of Americans, regardless of political party, want the rules for the financial sector strengthened rather than weakened. Yet the major thrust of the bill approved by the banking committee today is to roll back important consumer safeguards as well as restraints on the kind of reckless practices that brought the financial system and the economy to the edge of collapse in 2008.

As today’s vote shows, a disturbing number of lawmakers are once again willing to act as shills for Wall Street and its discredited deregulatory agenda. But the sharply divided nature of that vote is heartening. Ten of the committee’s 22 members voted against the bill. Their continued support for Wall Street reform, along with the public’s support, makes it unlikely that this dangerous bill or anything like it will become law.