What is it, in just a few words or thoughts?

It's an abomination

It's a Rube Goldberg piece of legislation that is designed to satisfy all the lobbyists and permit the politicians to break their arms patting themselves on the back.

It's one of the most disgusting, inefficient, costly, and almost sure not to provide any benefit piece of legislation in the history of the U.S Congress.

For almost 70 years the U.S. banking system was kept largely healthy by the Glass-Steagall Act (GSA) of 1932. In a few words, the primary objectives of GSA was to separate investment and commercial banking activities. At the time, what was considered overzealous commercial bank involvement in stock market investment was deemed the main culprit of the financial crash of 1929. GSA prevented commercial banks from taking on too much risk with depositors' money.

The result of GSA? The U.S. commercial banking system operated for more than seventy years safely, and providing the credit and liquidity needed for a healthy and growing economy.

But the commercial bakers hated GSA. By keeping them under the thumb of some stiff regulation, all the rich, profitable financial business flowed to the investment banks, whose partners made tons of money. The commercial bankers wanted a piece of that action. They thought they could do investment banking just as well and make all those sweet bonuses like the investment bankers.

So in 1999 with amendments in 2001, the Gramm–Leach–Bliley Act was passed which allowed commercial banks, investment banks, securities firms, and insurance companies to consolidate.

And that was the beginning of the financial disaster that we've experienced in recent years.

I hope this was a simple enough explanation.