Eric Holder: The Reason Robert Rubin Isn't Behind Bars

[Crewleader]

09/29/2014

By Dean Baker



The big news item in Washington last week was Attorney General Eric Holder's decision to resign. Undoubtedly there are positives to Holder's tenure as attorney general, but one really big minus is his decision not to prosecute any of the Wall Street crew whose actions helped to prop up the housing bubble. As a result of this failure, the main culprits walked away incredibly wealthy even as most of the country has yet to recover from the damage they caused.

Just to be clear, it is not against the law to be foolish and undoubtedly many of the Wall Streeters were foolish. They likely believed that house prices would just keep rising forever. But the fact that they were foolish doesn't mean that they didn't also break the law. It's likely that most of the Enron felons believed in Enron's business model. After all, they held millions of dollars of Enron stock. But they still did break the law to make the company appear profitable when it wasn't.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/dean-baker/eric-holder-the-reason-ro_b_5904330.html

[Rod Beauvex]

1. Hmm.

I'm interested in seeing what cushy job Holder gets next.

[gladium et scutum]

2. Prosecution

I am not sure that this decision can be laid solely at AG Holder's feet. 95% of DOJ operations are rather mundane and routine. In that capacity, AG Holder probably ran his department without direct consultation with the President. However, looking at prosecuting some of the most well known financial executives in the country is far from routine. AG Holder would not launch proceeding of such a high political profile without first consulting his immediate superior, i.e. the President. IMO that AG Holder and the President discussed these issues and the decision was made that no indictments would be sought. If the President had felt strongly enough about this issue, I have no doubt that he would have directed his AG to proceed against those responsible for the housing bubble. I am sure that the Presidents input had a lot to do with the decisions not to prosecute.

[Fuddnik]

3. Rubin was pushing Obama early on.

He gave him an early stage at the Hamilton Project.

http://www.brookings.edu/about/projects/hamiltonproject

http://my.firedoglake.com/fflambeau/2009/12/07/obamas-smoking-gun-his-hamilton-project-speech-shows-his-links-to-goldman-entitlement-tuts-part-1/