I first encountered Elizabeth Warren’s work when I took a bankruptcy seminar some years ago. The class was billed as a “lunchtime” course. I thought that meant they’d give us lunch. It meant we skipped lunch to take the course.
I was hungry and therefore cranky, and flipping impatiently through the “supplementary” course materials (“right-leaning, advocate for lenders, lunatic laissez-faire right-winger, why oh why did I sign up for this?”) when I came on a piece Warren wrote for inclusion in a bankruptcy casebook.
Her work stuck out in that collection, because it was written from the perspective of the debtor, making the course “background” content, oh, probably, ten to one, lender/debtor. Fair and balanced.
This is a recent editorial by Elizabeth Warren, in a Florida newspaper. I don’t know if it’s in a Florida newspaper because that’s a very good place to talk about foreclosure, or because we won’t be seeing as much of Warren in the national media now that she’s selling her new regulatory agency, instead of overseeing the bank bailout and criticizing the Obama Administration. We’ll see.
In any event, I was pleased to see that she’s trying to get the word out. I suspect it will take her some time to bring people around to her wildly controversial views, like this one:
Had it existed, the new consumer agency could have stopped these problems before they multiplied. Many of the failures already admitted were not sophisticated scams that had been carefully concealed. By enforcing existing laws and involving state authorities early on, the agency could have made sure that the law was respected. No one would need to wonder whether the world of borrowing and lending works only one way: Families have to follow the legal rules, but the rules are optional for big banks.
I love that she did this, and hope it catches on:
A few weeks ago, I watched proceedings in a Fort Lauderdale foreclosure court and saw firsthand the painful outcomes for numerous families.
An afternoon spent watching proceedings in a state foreclosure court should be required coursework for lawmakers and regulators.
El Cid
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Sounds kind of communist. And I don’t know how it would help us in our primary tasks of stopping all the spending and getting people to live within their means.
Kay
@El Cid:
I know this is outrageous and wrong to say, and probably illegal, but wouldn’t that be more worthwhile than the scheduled Scalia lecture on the Conservative Constitution?
Tea Partiers are ivory tower elitists, El Cid.
Capri
Matt Taibbi sat in on some hearings, too. Sure to raise the bile.
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/matt-taibbi-courts-helping-banks-screw-over-homeowners-20101110
harokin
I’ve seen her debate and she’s excellent. I think she was an Oklahoma debate champion. I would love to see her challenged in congressional hearings — she would wipe the floor with them.
Her modest origins, incredible smarts, and tremendous communication skills make her a truly formidable force.
NobodySpecial
They need tutorials on how to screw people out of their stuff?
kay
@NobodySpecial:
I think they need to see what it looks like, person by person. It’s abstract as “policy”.
Bulworth
What kind of liberalfascismcommunismislamicist stuff is this? I wish we would get on with the real work of cutting taxes and eliminating the deficit.
Ruckus
An afternoon spent watching proceedings in a state foreclosure court should be required coursework for lawmakers and regulators.
How many do you think would learn anything positive, but that things are going as they should?
singfoom
BUT BUT Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac/Poor People!!!!!!!ONEONEONE
In all seriousness though, I hope that Warren and the new agency are able to halt some of the abuses we’ve seen in the last years.
I doubt it will change any of the structural issues we have, but at least they’re trying to deal with the side effects…..
And as for requiring knowledge and practical experience, HAH. Our legislators don’t need FACTS or KNOWLEDGE. They’ve got gumption! Gumption NEVER makes bad policy.
I really wish the new agency and M(r)s. Warren well, but I have very low hopes/expectations.
Call me when they threaten to revoke corporate charters or when Corporate Officers are hauled before courts to be held liable for the crimes of their businesses.
Brachiator
@Kay:
This is a damn good start. We need more people like Elizabeth Warren in public office.
This also means, I suppose, that she soon will be a target of a GOP led Congressional investigation.
cmorenc
@Kay:
It could also be that most of the money in bankruptcy law goes to:
1) Business lawyers representing creditors of people or entities who potentially might go bankrupt;
2) Bankruptcy trustees administering insolvent companies or their assets;
3) Consumer bankruptcy lawyers who do a volume business specializing heavily in that subject, in which case the best defense is understanding what legal remedies, tactics, or prophylactic measures might be employed against their client.
debbie
From what I’ve seen and read, she’s tough enough to stand up to their scummiest. This won’t be another Gramm smearing of Brooksley Born.
Brachiator
@debbie: RE: This also means, I suppose, that she soon will be a target of a GOP led Congressional investigation.
Unfortunately, the sick promise by some Republicans to investigate the Obama administration for … something … is just another attempt to grind government to a halt. It is tough to do your job when you also have to spend time preparing for pointless appearances before Congress.
Renfrew Squeevil (formerly Mumphrey Oddison Yamm)
@Ruckus:
You’re half right. It’s true, Jim DeMint will never come away from that believing anything other than what he does already. DeMint, Newt Gingrich, Dick Cheney, David Vitter, people like that, the worst of the Republicans that we’ve come to know and loathe, these people are all soulless sociopaths, and wouldn’t give a shit about people being run out of their houses unless they were somebody they actually care about. And soulless, sociopathic Republicans pretty much only care about their own immediate families, and maybe, in a few cases, good friends. Anybody else is meaningless to them, and unworthy of any empathy whatsoever.
There are, though, some Republicans who could watch something like that for a day and come away at least slightly changed. I even believe that there are some–a few–Republican politicians who could learn something from a day spent that way. Some are moderates like Olympia Snowe, who though spineless and easily browbeaten by her leaders, still has some measure of humanity, I believe. I think that she doesn’t want to do anything that she truly believes would hurt ordinary helpless people. It’s just that so often it’s so easy not to see that what she’s doing would hurt people. Numbers are abstract; people weeping in a courtroom where you’re sitting are real.
And there are others like her: Lugar, even Brown of Massachussetts. They aren’t true sociopaths, I believe: they don’t want to actively hurt people, and are even willing to stand up and say “No,” when they can see that something is likely to hurt people, but they’re also willing to look away so they don’t see the truth of what they’re doing. And, again, they’re weak and easily cowed by the likes of McConnell and Boehner.
The trick is to get them to see the consequences of their votes. Now for Democrats, as a rule, “seeing the consequences” can be as abstract as reading a report in the news or going over some statistics. For Republicans, all to often, “seeing the consequences” means meeting somebody in person who’s had their lives wrecked by those votes.
Look at Bush with Katrina. Bush is a turd, but he isn’t Cheney. He didn’t much care what happened before he went there because it wasn’t real to him, it was just a lot of numbers and words and maybe some pictures. Once he went there and was himself what had happened, I think he really was sorry that he hadn’t done more. He wasn’t sorry enough to take any responsibility or change his policies or his ways, but he did care at least in a perfunctory way, where Cheney, I think, never would have.
If even somebody as callow as Bush could find it in him to feel, even a little, for the people of Louisiana, then I think somebedy who’s already a good deal more human than Bush to begin with has even more room to grow. It’s too bad none of these people will ever go and sit in these courtrooms, but, again, I believe there could be some hope for a better outcome if any of them ever really did it.
Amir_Khalid
Sadly, I must disagree. Too many of the lawmakers and regulators you refer to are of an ilk with those who went to see the original Wall Street, and came out of the theater aspiring to be Gordon Gekko.
(Edited to remove an overbroad generalization.)
burnspbesq
@singfoom:
“Call me when they threaten to revoke corporate charters or when Corporate Officers are hauled before courts to be held liable for the crimes of their businesses.”
Call me when you can point to a statute that allows any of those things to be done. I read something recently (don’t remember where, might have been th ABA Journal) about the good work being done on mortgage origination fraud issues by the US Attorney’s office for the Eastern District of California). The head of the task force pointed out that making policy by litigation is a pretty inefficient process.
singfoom
@burnspbesq: I won’t claim that statues exist that allow those things to be done because they don’t exist. Back in the old days the State could revoke a corporate charter, but in those days corps were created for very specific reasons….
I would agree with that making policy by litigation is inefficient, but ask yourself, do you think our legislature will fix any of the problems with the financial markets anytime soon?
All I’m saying is that while I support Warren and the new Consumer Protection Agency, the problems that we face WRT the current structure of our financial system are larger than the Consumer Protection agency can possibly deal with.
The work is important, but I continue to see nothing that will change the behavior of the banksters on this. So good on Warren, and good on the CFPA or whatever, but I don’t think it’s going to change the big picture one little bit.
catclub
@Renfrew Squeevil (formerly Mumphrey Oddison Yamm):
“He wasn’t sorry enough to take any responsibility or change his policies or his ways, but he did care at least in a perfunctory way, where Cheney, I think, never would have.”
High praise indeed.
And what was the WORST thing about Katrina and its aftermath for Bush? Someone called him a racist.
At least he is not the type where everything is about him.
Over a thousand dead and thousands of homes destroyed?
Meh.
Ruckus
@Renfrew Squeevil (formerly Mumphrey Oddison Yamm):
And I think you made my point.
Politicians should not need to be swayed that helping people in real need is the right thing to do, especially in a country this big. The conservatives just don’t get it. They have to be dragged, screaming and kicking to do anything positive for their fellow man. You’ve named a few who might be convinced but at what cost? And don’t get me wrong there are quite a few democrats with not much better positions. And getting what we get may be the best that can be gotten given the soulless conservatives but my dog has a higher level of empathy than that shown by all conservatives. And that’s if you add them all up.
debbie
@Renfrew Squeevil (formerly Mumphrey Oddison Yamm)
All it would take would be for the Democrats to call as their witnesses a few people who have suffered the effects of the financial abuses. Ordinary, everyday people who are just as average as Joe the Plumber. Let them tell their stories. If the panel members aren’t moved, you can bet lots of other people will be. And if the Republicans block calling them as witnesses, grab the media mike and publicize what they did. Let the world know just how heartless these “compassionate conservatives” really are.
Renfrew Squeevil (formerly Mumphrey Oddison Yamm)
I’d like to make a few things a little plainer than I did. I was not praising Bush or his late, and perfunctory, sorrow at what he had helped bring about in New Orleans, though I guess it seemed like I was. He doesn’t get any credit from me for being one tenth human, when any really worthwhile human is at least 7 tenths human (scientifically proven!). I didn’t really make that clear.
I was only saying that if even Bush could show some small glimmer of humanity upon seeing such devestation and suffering, then there is the potential for some Republican politicians to be moved by seeing other people’s suffering in person, or at least by hearing other people tell, in person, about what they went through. I don’t think there are many that basic decency has any shot at all of getting through to, but there are a few.
I know there’s no way that anybody’s going to mandate that conservative politicians sit in person through a day of foreclosure hearings, but if it somehow happened, there’s a chance some of these clowns might learn some elemental compassion from it.
Ruckus
@Renfrew Squeevil (formerly Mumphrey Oddison Yamm):
Maybe I need to be more concise.
I call bullshit that any current day conservative in politics or government would learn anything positive for anyone but themselves, and that would be to do more of the same because it’s getting their desired results.
Bush learned nothing, changed nothing, and continued to do more of the same. He’s still the same heartless prick he always was.
mvr
@Brachiator:
Like to see that one. And the way the Daily Show comments on it.
Renfrew Squeevil (formerly Mumphrey Oddison Yamm)
@Ruckus:
Well, some of them do learn, as I think can be proven by the few who even go so far as to leave the Republican Party. It’s true that most of these people are beyond help, Bush among them. He is the same soulless dickhead he ever was, but if nothing else, seeing what happened in New Orleans firsthand made him a little sad. For Bush, being sad about the plight of somebody he never knew and who was nothing like him is a pretty big deal. Note, I said “for Bush”. It’s nothing to normal people; it isn’t even the least we expect from fully developed humans with fully developed souls. For Bush, showing even the faintest glimmer of sadness at somebody else’s shitty situation is a big deal.
But, as I said, clearly some of these people can learn, as shown by the fact that they leave the party.