....speaking of fraud, T reminded me of this bit from the Frontline doc about Brooksley (what a name!*) Born:
He said something to the effect that, "Well, Brooksley, we're never going to agree on fraud." And she said, "Well, what do you mean?" And he said, "You probably think there should be rules against it." And she said, "Well, yes, I do." He said, you know, "I think the market will figure it out and take care of the fraudsters."
Greenspan didn't believe that fraud was something that needed to be enforced, and he assumed she probably did. And of course, she did. I've never met a financial regulator who didn't feel that fraud was part of their mission.
And this is an absolute stunner for the new head of this tiny agency who is charged with making sure people don't commit fraud.
Well, I think she was taken aback about how far he would go towards deregulation, that even the notion that we should police fraudulent activity he didn't think was something that was a given.
That was her introduction to Alan Greenspan.
That flips me out so completely I can't even think of any cutesy illiterate "I can't even" Tumblrspeak slang to communicate my flippedness. I am flipped like a whole pile of truck-stop flapjacks. The market will take care of fraud? Will it take care of theft and murder and rape too? Does he imagine Adam Smith's Invisible Hand is going to morph into the long arm of the law and reach out to fist all criminal activity into submission? What the hell.
*It begins with a father who wants a boy. She was born in San Francisco. Her father was a welfare agency executive for a long time. And he thought it would be great to have a son. His best friend at the time was named Brooks, and he thought, "I'll name my son Brooks." But he ended up with a girl and he named her Brooksley at the last minute, feminizing it.
descensus Averno facilis est