A colleague asked “why do you think the TV air waves are filled with so many crime and justice show from CSI to Law and Order:The Latest Variation on a Theme?” A bit no plussed ye Editor replied “Look at the venerable history of thrillers and whodunnits over the past 200 years starting with Mary and Edgar Allan – its in the blood.” The response…”Nahh, the only place one can find a hint of swift and fair justice is on the TV screen.” Ye Editor just laughed. But three articles caught my attention and changed my opinion:
NYTimes – Former NH Mortgage Executive gets 15 years for Ponzi scheme – it appears the only way to get a mortgage meltdown conviction is on blatant Ponzi Scheming.
MortgageMeltdown.typepad.com -In First Subprime Criminal Trial, Managers Of Bear Stearns Hedge Fund Acquitted- this is an absolute must read on white crime trials; and so is the whole website.
HuffingtonPost – Too Big to Jail – this report from last summer demonstrate the tremendous influence the bank lobby has on the Obama administration.
Rolling Stone – “Everybody has fucked up, but Nobody has to go to jail – that’s your whole story…”
These three posts illustrate the case that the Obama administration simply is not pursuing civil or criminal prosecutions of consequence against the top executives responsible for the Mortgage Meltdown in contrast what was done 15 years before in the Savings and Loan debacle. Now the banks are allowed to report on their own wrong doings and ,of course , very few have. The only convictions are slam dunk Ponzi schemes as the NYTimes story.
Some argue that the government is handcuffed because there are 16-20 different agencies doing the regulation. These agencies have a confusion of responsibilities and legal prerogatives which regulatory reform did not change. Others say that these agencies lacked the laws to do the prosecutions[and cite the Galleon Insider trading prosecutions by the SEC as an example of competence when the law books are solid]; but now with Dodd-Frank Financial Regulations Bill the agencies are now armed and dangerous.
But ye Editor is not so sanguine. Many of the provisions of the Dodd-Frank bill have yet to be specified; but rather worked out in consultation with the affected financial banks and institutions, the regulating agencies along with a now split Congress. Given its lax co-operation and singular lack of determination to root out Too Big To Fail, the financial community will certainly want to protect their own in Super LLC [Super Limited Liability Contracts-in-law]. And of course they have the bucks and Supreme Court of the US anointed lobbying power to assure that Laws on the Dodd-Frank books get written “their way”.
So it appears that White Collar Crime continues to pay big time .As expected, Justice will only be served on TV. But even worse, this failure on Too Big To Jail seems to confirm that Too Big To Fail III: Shaking the Union is only a matter of time in months not years or decades.