Elizabeth Warren thread

[Mazmaz]

I see good things in her future.

Video in link.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/0...n_2688998.html

Elizabeth Warren Embarrasses Hapless Bank Regulators At First Hearing

WASHINGTON -- Bank regulators got a sense Thursday of how their lives will be slightly different now that Elizabeth Warren sits on a Senate committee overseeing their agencies.

At her first Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee hearing, Warren questioned top regulators from the alphabet soup that is the nation's financial regulatory structure: the FDIC, SEC, OCC, CFPB, CFTC, Fed and Treasury.

The Democratic senator from Massachusetts had a straightforward question for them: When was the last time you took a Wall Street bank to trial? It was a harder question than it seemed.

"We do not have to bring people to trial," Thomas Curry, head of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, assured Warren, declaring that his agency had secured a large number of "consent orders," or settlements.

"I appreciate that you say you don't have to bring them to trial. My question is, when did you bring them to trial?" she responded.

"We have not had to do it as a practical matter to achieve our supervisory goals," Curry offered.

Warren turned to Elisse Walter, chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission, who said that the agency weighs how much it can extract from a bank without taking it to court against the cost of going to trial.

"I appreciate that. That's what everybody does," said Warren, a former Harvard law professor. "Can you identify the last time when you took the Wall Street banks to trial?"

"I will have to get back to you with specific information," Walter said as the audience tittered.

"There are district attorneys and United States attorneys out there every day squeezing ordinary citizens on sometimes very thin grounds and taking them to trial in order to make an example, as they put it. I'm really concerned that 'too big to fail' has become 'too big for trial,'" Warren said.

A Warren constituent, open-Internet activist Aaron Swartz, recently committed suicide after being hounded by federal prosecutors who reportedly said they wanted to "make an example" of him. Warren had met and said she admired Swartz and, after he died, expressed her concern by attending his memorial in Washington.

The financial regulators can blame, at least in part, Wall Street lobbyists (along with outgoing Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and Senate Republicans) for their embarrassing turn at the hearing. Warren would have been on the panel herself representing the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, instead of a sitting senator, if her nomination to head the agency hadn't been thwarted in 2011.

[Guyverarmor]

About damn time someone finally was blunt about it.

[GoggleHead]

We need more politicians with that sort of common sense approach to things.

[Moridam]

don't get too excited, the party will find a way to rein her in once her behavior begins to harm fundraising efforts.

[arus2001]

Incoming "accident" or assassination.

[Coren]

don't get too excited, the party will find a way to rein her in once her behavior begins to harm fundraising efforts.

Until citizen's united is overturned (either by the courts, congress, or lolconstitutionalamendment), this is true. There's too much money going through washington to let a senator piss off people like this.

Also, I <3 Warren. I agree we need about 500 more senators and reps just like her. Maybe then there'd finally be a little accountability. The fact that a relatively small group of people managed to not only wreck the entire world's economy but also profit obscenely from it is fucking crazy. That those same people not only aren't in jail, but have never even been charged is even more crazy.

[Drex]

Oh look, somebody said something, let's celebrate!

Every time.

[Talint]

Oh look, somebody said something, let's celebrate!

Every time.

Like, are you being purposefully obtuse?

Cause it's fine if you are. But I feel that it's worth noting.

[Pooky]

Until citizen's united is overturned (either by the courts, congress, or lolconstitutionalamendment), this is true. There's too much money going through washington to let a senator piss off people like this.

Also, I <3 Warren. I agree we need about 500 more senators and reps just like her. Maybe then there'd finally be a little accountability. The fact that a relatively small group of people managed to not only wreck the entire world's economy but also profit obscenely from it is fucking crazy. That those same people not only aren't in jail, but have never even been charged is even more crazy.

I don't know, they threw a metric fuckton of money against her in the election vs brown and she still won. I can't wait to see her keep coming down on the financial industry, maybe then it'll show other senators they're allowed to grow some balls and stand up to wall st.

[Salodin]

I don't know, they threw a metric fuckton of money against her in the election vs brown and she still won. I can't wait to see her keep coming down on the financial industry, maybe then it'll show other senators they're allowed to grow some balls and stand up to wall st.

You act like they WANT to stand up. Wall st pays for their very comfortable retirement.

[mightyg]

Man, I thought there would be pics in here...

[kuronosan]

Man, I thought there would be pics in here...

Register to see the NSFW content

[Talint]

Elizabeth Warren: Bust banks that launder drug money

If you’re caught with an ounce of cocaine, the chances are good you go to jail. If you’re caught repeatedly, you can go to jail for life. Incidentally, if you launder nearly a billion dollars in drug money, your company pays a fine and you go home and sleep in your own bed at night.

Related: Massachusetts is officially absolved of their wrongdoing in propelling Scott Brown/tea party shitheads into government.

[cloydjackson]

This is simply women power! Senator-elect Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts will apparently be a member of the Senate Banking Committee, reports from inside the Senate indicate. While no formal decision will be made before the U.S. Senate re-convenes, it is thought that Elizabeth Warren is a natural, considering her role in the early formation of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the Dodd-Frank Act.

[Qalbert]

thanks cloyd

[Byrthnoth]

Is that a DNC spam bot?

[BaneTheBrawler]

sure looks like it to me. that's like the headline and first few sentences of an article you'd find on page 3 or something.

[Mazmaz]

what's a Dancer spam bot?

[MF Perm tha Fineass]

what's a Dancer spam bot?

I don't care if this is an awful joke or just plain stupidity, this shit should be banable

[Lonewind]

it's really refreshing for someone to really say something, just hope it lasts, and pray for her safety.