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Showing Original Post only (View all)Obama Puts Fox In Charge of Henhouse By Matt Taibbi, Rolling Stone [View all]
http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/15711-focus-obama-puts-fox-in-charge-of-henhouseI was shocked when I heard that Mary Jo White, a former U.S. Attorney and a partner for the white-shoe Wall Street defense firm Debevoise and Plimpton, had been named the new head of the SEC.
I thought to myself: Couldn't they have found someone who wasn't a key figure in one of the most notorious scandals to hit the SEC in the past two decades? And couldn't they have found someone who isn't a perfect symbol of the revolving-door culture under which regulators go soft on suspected Wall Street criminals, knowing they have million-dollar jobs waiting for them at hotshot defense firms as long as they play nice with the banks while still in office?
I'll leave it to others to chronicle the other highlights and lowlights of Mary Jo White's career, and focus only on the one incident I know very well: her role in the squelching of then-SEC investigator Gary Aguirre's investigation into an insider trading incident involving future Morgan Stanley CEO John Mack. While representing Morgan Stanley at Debevoise and Plimpton, White played a key role in this inexcusable episode.
As I explained a few years ago in my story, "Why Isn't Wall Street in Jail?": The attorney Aguirre joined the SEC in 2004, and two days into his job was asked to look into reports of suspicious trading activity involving a hedge fund called Pequot Capital, and specifically its megastar trader, Art Samberg. Samberg had made suspiciously prescient trades ahead of the acquisition of a firm called Heller Financial by General Electric, pocketing about $18 million in a period of weeks by buying up Heller shares before the merger, among other things.
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Obama Puts Fox In Charge of Henhouse By Matt Taibbi, Rolling Stone [View all]
wilsonbooks
Jan 2013
OP
Hey, don'cha know that putting a fox in charge of the henhouse is a bad thing only when someone like
kath
Jan 2013
#3
I knew he would be back under the bus, he hasn't learned to ONLY PRAISE authority
Dragonfli
Jan 2013
#27
Taibbi forgets that there's a distinction between being a defense lawyer and a prosecutor.
Zen Democrat
Jan 2013
#9
Taibbi is plenty smart enough. He just likes to talk shit and enjoys being a cynic.
phleshdef
Jan 2013
#10
The logic of some is unbelievable. Since she has shown to be tough, then she will be tough
rhett o rick
Jan 2013
#16
You do realize by your logic a pedophile would be ideal to head a child rape taskforce
Dragonfli
Jan 2013
#25