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Elizabeth Warren is supposed to be a divisive figure, someone that Republicans (and some Democrats) who want to protect bank profits would reject out of hand. And yet, Republicans who have worked with her closely on the Congressional Oversight Panel, monitoring the TARP, showered her with praise yesterday:
The two Republican appointees to the Congressional Oversight Panel, the group chaired by Warren that oversees the government’s $700 billion bank bailout program, issued a statement saying that while they disagreed with many of Warren’s views and opposed the creation of the consumer watchdog, they had found their dealings with her “to be collegial and professional.”
The pair praised Warren for conducting exhaustive investigations into the federal government’s rescue of firms such as American International Group and GMAC, even when those reviews produced results that didn’t always shine a glowing light on the Treasury Department.
“It is important to note that the panel has been critical of policies and decisions implemented by Democrats and Republicans alike,” wrote University of Kentucky economics Professor Kenneth Troske and J. Mark McWatters, a Dallas lawyer and certified public accountant, who serve on the five-member panel. “There is great virtue in that because, while it is easy to question the decisions made by members of the other political party, it takes courage to publicly question the decisions made by members of your own party.”
They added, “We often debate a wide variety of issues with Professor Warren and have found her quite willing to modify her views if presented with well-reasoned, cogent arguments.”
Troske and McWatters made the key point, that Warren is seemingly being avoided for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau job because as someone conducting oversight of TARP, she was critical of the Treasury Department who was implementing it. That’s precisely what you would want in a regulator, someone with the integrity to let the facts and not loyalty or good manners dictate their criticisms. She has proven hereself in the area of independent oversight. “What point is there in having a watchdog that is a blind supporter of, or an apologist for, the subject of its oversight,” Troske and McWatters conclude. “How can the public expect overseers to function in a transparent and accountable manner if subsequent political appointments become contingent on looking the other way?”
Troske and McWatters were chosen for the Congressional Oversight Panel by none other than Mitch McConnell and John Boehner.
In today’s Boston Globe, Charles Fried, solicitor general in the Reagan Administration, not only endorses Warren, but thinks she should get a recess appointment.
That’s where Elizabeth Warren comes in. Those who are lobbying hard against her nomination to head the Consumer Financial Protection Agency are the same people who lobbied against financial reform legislation and lost. They paint her as the enemy of capitalism and free markets. Nothing could be further from the truth: She is the enemy of dishonesty, abuse, and just plain theft.
Many of those who originated the toxic loans now poisoning the financial world were outright fraudsters, and many of those who bundled and purveyed those toxic assets in what amounted to a giant Ponzi scheme were no better than fences of stolen goods. Credit card companies for years have buried surprising fees, penalties, and interest rate increases in print so fine and terms so obscure that the borrowers most likely to be caught by them could not possibly understand them. That’s not capitalism; that’s fraud. To be the scourge of theft and fraud is to be the best friend of well-functioning markets.
As Shahien Nasiripour notes, Republicans in the Senate, who actually have a vote in the matter, have repeatedly praised Warren’s work, particularly Olympia Snowe (R-ME) and Chuck Grassley (R-IA). Two Republicans, John Thune and Bob Corker, quoted Warren approvingly on the Senate floor last week (I don’t think those two will vote for her, but it’s a nice point in her favor).
In other words, when Chris Dodd says that Warren isn’t confirmable, what he actually means is that she isn’t confirmable to him.
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I’ve just lost all respect for nearly the entire Senate, not that I had much respect for them in the first place. Over the past year, their duplicity has been obvious. They “craft” legislation that undermines the peoples’ ability to live freely, while telling interviewers the opposite. They write up proposals they have no intention of enacting: They use the opposing political party as a foil for legislation they never intended to propose, so that they can go on teevee and act as if they tried hard for us. I believe it is commonly called “speaking with a forked tongue” or “talking out of both sides of the mouth.” It’s always happened, but at least Senators used to try to hide it.
I guess the word “craft” is apt for the legislation they produce – as in “The Craft”, incantations, voodoo, the arcane.
In the end, I think Warren will get the job, but only after the Senate and the White House have found a way to marginalize or constrain her authority to do the job. I hope I’m wrong, but patterns never lie.
O.K. Now I’m worried.
So, “uncomfirmable” = bullshit.
Liz Warren for recess appointment!
Is it? Or does it mean she’s been bought off?
I know, I know, she is of too-high moral principle, blah blah blah.
So were Kuchinich.
And Sanders.
And Feingold.
And on, and on…
Yep, just like when Kent Conrad said early on that there were not enough votes for the public option. He was saying that he would oppose the public option and try to drag other Democratic Senators with him.
The longer Obama waits to announce the appointment, the more likely I think it is that it will be a recess appointment of Warren. How long is it until the Congressional recess.
I don’t trust the Republicans saying they will vote for her. Sounds like the sort of entrapment the Republicans laid for healthcare reform with Olympia Snowe and cheerleading Baucus into the “Gang of Six” process. A means to delay.
Good thread, David.
Now, if we can just keep the congers from spaying and neutering the Bureau, itself, so that Warren, IF she gets it, can actually make a difference.
What’s not to say the Republicans are playing the same game the Democrats do? Oh, they’re all against war funding, except if there isn’t enough votes to pass it, then they’ll do it.
Since it is obvious she isn’t going to get approved, Republicans can call the Democrats bluff and say how she’s OK in their book, knowing they’ll never have to confirm her.
Right. Trash her before she even gets the job. Great perspective.
Of course some of the Rs, like Thune and Corker, are playing chicken here but that does’t change the fact that Warren would change the DC dynamic by being a person who actually believes in regulation. Interesting that Dodd, the now completely unabashed financial corporate stooge, feels safe attacking Warren. He probably does that so that Team Obama can spend more time attacking teachers unions as they fight to change the conversation to another subject.
Teachers need to be held to increasing standards – financial parasites with proven incompetence need to be left to collect hundreds of billions in taxpayer welfare checks with as little oversight as is possible.
If Team Obama wanted to get Warren in the office they would have been capitalizing on momentum and actually leading for a change. The Rs understand that the administration is running out the clock so they can say whatever plays to the crowd.
Not “confirmable” to Rahm and Timmy and Obama listens to these two guys as if they were collectively the Oracle of Delphi.
Only in the U.S. would some of the public see teachers as “parasites.” And they say the U.S. isn’t an anti-intellectual country. Of course don’t pay any part in the equation of poor performance. U.S. students are dumbed down by distraction.
Yeah, right,whatever.
I have been one of Warren’s strongest supporters and will remain so until I see a reason to change. My point is that no one has proved to be above compromise yet, and let’s hope the GOP’s embracing of her is not an indication that she has – or might – join the crowd.
Is this sufficiently clear, or would you like drawings?
No, Sparky, I don’t need drawings.
More Kabuki show brought to you by your overpaid Senators who do nothing for you, as a voter and citizen. They’re all beholden to the MIC powers that be, and I don’t believe any one of them ever under any circumstances.
I would like to see Warren appointed, but if some Republics are now showing up to say “me likey Warren,” I don’t trust them anymore than Dems.
Aggravating. Waste of money. It’ll be over when it’s over.
Clearly, Repubs are astounded that anyone could ever criticize anyone in their own political party or at the same end of the spectrum. They just don’t do that in the GOP.
It makes sense for some R’s to tolerate her so long as the D’s are in the Whitehouse.
That said, if the R’s ever make it back into the Whitehouse, they’d give her the boot mighty quick.
Bipartisanship at last! Obama gets what he has been seeking since the start of his “presidency”.
This is Republicans throwing the first bowl of jello in what they hope will be a Democratic food fight between Obama and the progressives in his party to whom he frequently gives a Bronx cheer.
If it gets Warren where she can do some good, fine. But expect Republicans to attempt to block any consumer-oriented move she makes, and to attempt to castrate her office should they gain control of the House in November. A lot can happen in the meantime.
Sorry SoDrag, I couldn’t resist. Given your initial comment, however…
…look at it this way: At least I didn’t offer you perspective drawings!
I would have agreed with your comment if it had a more positive tone, like:
One would hope that if appointed and confirmed Warren wouldn’t succumb to the corruption of the system, as have…
Ever since the joke that was the Clinton Administration, SoDrag, positivity in matters involving the Democratic Party has not been my longsuit.
I think the Republicans would flip around quickly enough if Warren neared confirmation. They’re just working to embarrass the Democrats, here.
In this case, at least, I’m looking more at who she is as a person rather than another cog in the political wheel. If she gets the job we’ll see.
We will, and I hope in this case that past performance is an indication of future returns :) Given the capitulation we’ve witnessed in lo, just these past two years, however, skepticism has usurped the hope inspired in me by the words of then-Senator Obama.
When the great masters of the word “NO” are on your side and cheering you on, I would strongly suggest a more than cursory look behind the curtain!
As in everything coming out of DC these days, I smell somethin’ rotten here…