Elizabeth Warren, Harvard Professor and consumer advocate, has been the leading candidate to run the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. It was, in fact, Warren’s idea to create such an agency in the first place.
Ms. Warren first came to our attention in the 2006 documentary Maxed Out, which was a film that showed the severe consumer debt crisis in America and how banks and lenders took advantage of borrowers, essentially indebting them for life. Warren knew then that the outcome of the consumer debt bubble would leave to crisis.
Warren is current the chairwoman of the Congressional oversight panel that oversees the distribution of TARP funds, essentially the watchdog of the US Treasury Department headed by Mr. Timothy Geithner.
Here is a brief exchange between the two at a Congressional hearing:
This was just one of many exchanges, and Secretary Geithner looks none to happy about being called out on how TARP funds were distributed to companies and banks.
According to the Huffington Post, Geithner is none to pleased about the possibility of Warren heading the new CFPB:
Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner has expressed opposition to the possible nomination of Elizabeth Warren to head the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, according to a source with knowledge of Geithner’s views.
The financial reform bill passed by the Senate on Thursday mandates the creation of a new federal entity charged with protecting consumers from predatory lenders.
…
Yet while her work on behalf of a federal unit designed solely to protect borrowers from abusive lenders has been embraced by the administration, Warren’s role as a bailout watchdog led to strained relations with the agency her panel has taken to task with brutal reports every month since Obama took office: Geithner’s Treasury Department.
…
Warren’s persistent oversight is part of the reason for Geithner’s opposition, according to the source.
In addition, her increasing public profile could make it difficult for Geithner, who will oversee the unit until it’s transferred to the Federal Reserve. His role would involve trying to balance her advocacy on behalf of borrowers with the demands of the nation’s major financial institutions, his traditional constituency.
Geithner’s objections to Warren taking over that role also involve her views on Wall Street, sources say. The longtime professor believes the nation’s megabanks are Too Big To Fail and have been among the biggest abusive lenders in the country. Her toughness on giant banks is said to be a longtime source of tension with Geithner.
Warren has been on the forefront of warning not just the American people, but the Obama administration. She has direct access to the President’s advisers and we believe she’s not afraid to tell it like it is.
Warren on August 13, 2009:
“You’re going to have a commercial real estate collapse that is going to dwarf the sub prime problem….”
“Expect 50% and 60% Default Rates On Commercial Real Estate Mortgagesâ€
Warren on January 10, 2010:
“It is simple. This is America’s middle class. We’ve hacked at it, and chipped at it, and pulled on it for thirty years now. And now there’s no more to do. Either we fix this problem going forward or the game really is over.â€
Warren on March 8, 2010:
I am afraid. I’m afraid because of what I see in the real economy. I’m afraid because I don’t see books that are clean – balance sheets that have been cleaned up. I’m afraid because in October of 2008 Secretary Paulson came to the American people and said the problem is toxic assets on the books of the banks, and they’re still there. I’m afraid because Secretary Paulson said there’s too much concentration in the banking industry and there’s even more concentration today than there was fifteen months ago…
We would have approved of Warren’s appointment anyway, but Geithner’s opposition makes us want Elizabeth Warren for the job that much more.
Regardless of what one may think of her politics (she’s reportedly a Democrat), regulatory oversight of the nation’s financial institutions should transcend party lines.
If there’s one thing we’ve learned about Elizabeth Warren in the last several years, it’s that she really does care about consumers. Because the agency being established is to protect not banks, but consumers from unfair lending practices, we second her nomination.
It’s simple – Geithner doesn’t want Warren heading the new Consumer Protection Financial Bureau because her eyes are OPEN, and she’s not bought and paid for (I would like to know how that happened actually).
I love how these goons frame their situation always in the same fashion – “Either your protect against default, or you have a cataclysmic event in the economy.”
That’s the idea Tim and it’s called purging the markets of bad debt. Maybe you’ve heard of it – free markets? What goes up must come down. Except we can’t every let anything come down anymore, since it was a farce when things went up. The markets have been rigged so much and for so long that when it goes it is going to do so in tsunami fashion.
Again, I must postulate that these morons MUST KNOW that the glue will come undone eventually. So what are they buying time for? How much longer do we have? I wish I knew.
They know it’s coming down… There is no way they don’t know what’s going to happen.
Like you said, it’s just a matter of “when” not “if.”
It was over when George W said ” we have to destroy free enterprise, Â to save free enterprise ” ( my paraphrase)
In Oct. 2008, when we ( our nation) threw out over 200 years of  The Rule of Law, by bailing out failed banks, insurance, industries,  it was a given then that the SHTF  was inevitable.
Now it is everyone not  TBTF, that is toast.  2 years latter, we are still sinking…..brace yourselves for the collision.  It is coming.
“I’ve abandoned free market principles to save the free market system”. – George Bush, Dec.16 2008
warren appears to be intelligent, honest and outspoken and, therefore, has no chance of being appointed. she reminds me of brooksley born – and look what they did to her! ! ! ! !
Its just more of the good cop, bad cop just like Gibbs and Pelosi earlier this week. We will see a lot more head fakes in the weeks to come.
Take the CitiGroup head fake earlier this week when the markets rallied, today we find out CitiGroup plunged 37%.
The head Lies will just keep coming to falsely sucker people back into the markets.
As I watched Fox News last night on the Deep Water cap now in place I had to wonder if it was real. It seemed just to clear, no currents mucking up the bottom even as the robot moved.
Just think about it.
It sounds typical that the juiced- in Goldman Sach’s cronies don’t want a Havard Professor and consumer advocate. Don’t forget the qualifications of Tim (I only wear womens clothes on Saturday night) Geithner. He failed at everything his done, NYfed chairman, etc.  To be nominated for high positions in Washington (fed chair, treasury sec,) you must “follow zee orders” of the jew illuminatti and be a total looooooser. I.E. Timmy boy. Â
Liz Warren would bring a welcome change but she will be hitting some strong headwind from the Goldman boys.
I have to agree with Patriot One, Ms. Warren and Mr. Geitner’s little charade is just more of the good cop/bad cop game. You are not going to get appointed to any position in Government, unless you are willing to go along with the program. I remember the auto manufacturers, when they went to ask for bailout money, being hammered by some congressmen about flying in a private jet while asking for money. Did they get their money? Yes they did and we got the show. You want a consumer protection agency, give me a construction worker, a grocery store worker, a small business owner, ect. These are people who provide a product to consumers, as well as, being a consumer themselves.Â
I trust no man who plucks his eyebrows…
 I’m just sayin
The first time I paid attention to Professor Warren’s work was during the “October Surprise†of 2008.  Many of us sat riveted (and schocked) watching the Fed Chair, Secretary of Treasury and leaders of congress standing together at the same press conference telling us essentially the world was going to end unless we wrote a check for one trillion dollars and it had to clear by the end of the week. The next day in my search for more news on the financial crisis, there she was on a CSpan press conference, Professor Warren, with such clarity, calm and honesty I have been a fan from that day forward. My gut told me “I trust her”.  When I wrote my book, The Commercial Real Estate Tsunami, I made of point of referring readers to the reports on the Congressional Oversight Panel’s web site and her work as Chairman of the COP.  Professor Warren is brilliant, wise and unafraid of the Washington “power” establishment.  She exemplifies what we need more of and I only hope her strong will and popular public identity will protect her from being taken down by those who are threatened by someone willing to point out that “the emperor has no clothes “ when necessary.  I can’t say enough about how much I and many of my associates and partners in the study of the commercial real estate debt crisis respect Professor Warren and her work.   A voice of reason in a city of deaf ears, all the best to you Professor Warren.
Tony Wood, Author of The Commercial Real Estate Tsunami-A Survival Guide For Lenders, Owners, Buyers and Brokers
http://www.tonywoodconsulting.com
Geithner and all those idiots on WS are walking around with big fat bulls eyes on their backs. Their running scared, when this puppy implodes and it will, all this 1099 BS reporting and everything else is going out the window.
Your going to have 60 to 100 million pissed off armed citizens and their going to be looking for someone to blame! Politicians, banksters, government cronies; their is a big case of hard times coming because of the greed of all these people and Dr. Guillotine may live again.
May we all find some clear thinking in the days ahead and pray for a peaceful transition into the next USA whatever that may bring!