Courtesy of Pam Martens.
SEC Commissioner, Kara Stein (left); Senator Elizabeth Warren (right)
Senator Elizabeth Warren from Massachusetts is a household name in America. Kara Stein is not. But both of these women are having a seismic impact on entrenched Wall Street group-think in Washington.
Stein is one of the five Commissioners of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), appointed by President Obama and sworn in just 22 months ago. Stein brought a unique set of qualifications to the SEC: from 2009 to 2013, Stein served as Staff Director of the Securities, Insurance, and Investment Subcommittee of the Senate Banking Committee. She is credited with playing a key role in drafting significant portions of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act.
What Warren and Stein have in common are values of right and wrong that resonate deeply with the American people and the willingness to speak common sense truths that challenge the status quo thinking about Wall Street. Warren was a former law professor at Harvard; Stein has a law degree from Yale. These attributes have Wall Street in a deep sweat.
Last Wednesday, the same day that the U.S. Department of Justice announced criminal guilty pleas from two U.S. banks, Citigroup and JPMorgan Chase, and three foreign banks, RBS, Barclays and UBS, the SEC granted all five banks waivers so that they could continue business as usual. Stein wrote a dissenting opinion, effectively shaming the SEC. Noting the serial crimes these banks have been committing for years, Stein wrote:
“Allowing these institutions to continue business as usual, after multiple and serious regulatory and criminal violations, poses risks to investors and the American public that are being ignored. It is not sufficient to look at each waiver request in a vacuum…
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