Amazing how many people are speaking out, how much is known about the corrupt and conflicted relationship between Wall Street and the government, how much evidence there is, and how nothing will get done about it. (Recent example: The Justice Department Seems Incapable of Making Cases Against Wall Street. Elliot Spitzer writes, "How do we make sense of this? Goldman Sachs emails call their own investments “junk” and “crap,” and Goldman Sachs salespeople refer to clients as 'muppets' and 'elephants. Yet the Justice Department says there is not enough evidence to bring a case on behalf of Goldman Sachs investors who lost vast sums of money." ??)
Ms. Fosters asks "Why won’t the government listen?" It comes back to the obvious, the politicians don't want to.
Obama Administration Needs to Tap, Not Stiff-Arm, Wall Street Whistleblowers
By Eileen Foster, Rolling Stone
Testifying recently before a Senate panel, the U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner hailed progress in "repairing and reforming" the financial sector since the passage of the Wall Street reform act two years ago. Geithner's sunny take sits awkwardly with the recent news that large international banks conspired to "fix" the LIBOR, the interbank loan rate, and that a leading American bank, J.P. Morgan Chase, lost almost $6 billion of dollars on botched trades – revelations that, as former Sen. Chris Dodd (of Dodd-Frank fame) wrote last month, "makes the strongest case … for strong oversight of Wall Street."
But why, four years after large banks brought our economy to the brink of disaster, are we still reading about fraud, deceit, and reckless gambling by leading banks? The answer is partly that Wall Street has done everything in its considerable power to shred financial reform. But another big reason is that the Department of Justice has failed, inexplicably, to tap into the intelligence that financial whistleblowers like myself have tried to offer them.
As a Countrywide Home Loans executive in 2007, I supervised fraud investigators and reported to federal regulators and the company’s Board of Directors. That year, our investigations showed that commission-hungry Countrywide loan officers routinely forged borrowers’ signatures and doctored income and asset statements.
We opened many of these investigations on whistleblowers’ tips. Later I learned that many of those reporting or challenging fraudulent practices were transferred, demoted, harassed or fired in reprisal. To suppress whistleblowers and their concerns, Countrywide directed them to report their allegations to the suspect officials’ managers. It was a trap, and the system was rigged. Instead of taking action, the managers would then share the information with the suspects themselves, who would then hit back at the whistleblowers.
Keep reading: Obama Administration Needs to Tap, Not Stiff-Arm, Wall Street Whistleblowers | Eileen Foster | Politics News | Rolling Stone.
