Congressional panel on financial crisis --- leadership?
Congress will soon announce a panel to investigate the causes of the financial crisis. This will be designed to be an attention getter as well as a serious probe of the events. Names being discussed in the media as the possible chair of this panel are Sandra Day O'Connor, Paul Volcker, and Arthur Levitt. All three have stints of distinguished public service, but are they really the ones to dig into what happened. The rationale for these possible choices is that they will underscore the gravity of the effort with their impeccable credentials. A better focus might be whether they would undertake a thorough and tough analysis that would dare look beyond the cliches that we currently live with.
Volcker, among the three, is the best choice for pure knowledge of financial markets. He is compromised to some extent, at least superficially, because he already plays an economic policy role in the Obama administration. As an investigator he is a questionable choice because, just my guess, his attitude would by why waste all of this time and expense on an investigation, "I'll tell you what happened." What he would say might just as good as what months later would be concluded by whatever committee, but that's not the spirit of an investigation.
Levitt is perhaps the most likely of the three to take a real hands on roll up the sleeves approach to the work rather than delegating it all out. He is, however, the least qualified by his nature because he is so absolutist in his views and comes across as a remarkably stubborn accountant. His media interviews and newspaper op-ed pieces over the past year on mark to market accounting show a man who will not acknowledge any aspect of an opposing view as having the least bit of merit.
O'Connor is an odd name to put forward. She does, as a jurist, have experience balancing opposing views and formulating cohesive responses. Her background is not focused on financial matters and there could be both pluses and minuses to that. Her family does have financial connections with her brother Robert Day being a founder and CEO of Trust Company of the West. He's been immensely successful with the family money and is one of those arch-conservative wealth rules types that you find in the southwest. In the last year he has been tainted by a scandal involving share trading in a major French bank and whatever the truth or resolution of the matter is it's not a plus since the panel results will be for global markets consumption, not just the U.S. Judging people by family members' actions is for the most part completely unfair, but for a role like this it's not completely irrelevant given the business he's in.
We wait and we will soon see the choices for this committee. Upon announcement it may be immediately clear whether this will be a serious effort or just a waste of taxpayer money to solidify the positions of special interests, including those of the government itself.
Volcker, among the three, is the best choice for pure knowledge of financial markets. He is compromised to some extent, at least superficially, because he already plays an economic policy role in the Obama administration. As an investigator he is a questionable choice because, just my guess, his attitude would by why waste all of this time and expense on an investigation, "I'll tell you what happened." What he would say might just as good as what months later would be concluded by whatever committee, but that's not the spirit of an investigation.
Levitt is perhaps the most likely of the three to take a real hands on roll up the sleeves approach to the work rather than delegating it all out. He is, however, the least qualified by his nature because he is so absolutist in his views and comes across as a remarkably stubborn accountant. His media interviews and newspaper op-ed pieces over the past year on mark to market accounting show a man who will not acknowledge any aspect of an opposing view as having the least bit of merit.
O'Connor is an odd name to put forward. She does, as a jurist, have experience balancing opposing views and formulating cohesive responses. Her background is not focused on financial matters and there could be both pluses and minuses to that. Her family does have financial connections with her brother Robert Day being a founder and CEO of Trust Company of the West. He's been immensely successful with the family money and is one of those arch-conservative wealth rules types that you find in the southwest. In the last year he has been tainted by a scandal involving share trading in a major French bank and whatever the truth or resolution of the matter is it's not a plus since the panel results will be for global markets consumption, not just the U.S. Judging people by family members' actions is for the most part completely unfair, but for a role like this it's not completely irrelevant given the business he's in.
We wait and we will soon see the choices for this committee. Upon announcement it may be immediately clear whether this will be a serious effort or just a waste of taxpayer money to solidify the positions of special interests, including those of the government itself.
posted by John Borden at 2:32 PM
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