If you live in the Washington-Wall Street power corridor, what do you think is the essential first task to reviving the economy? Repealing some of the very few protections against fraud in the market that were put in place after the multiple crises of the past decade. Only in the...

Originally published in Slate

Once again, the Puppets on Capitol Hill are about to slam the Muppets on Main Street. The country still hasn’t recovered from the Wall Street-induced financial cataclysm of 2008, yet Congress is preparing to enact the Orwellian ”JOBS Act”—a bill...

This week officials from the Obama administration, the banking regulators, and state Attorney Generals announced a settlement of claims stemming from the financial crisis. The nominal amount put forward as the cost of the settlement is $26 billion, and in return the banks will be released from civil claims on...

Finally, a presidential candidate came out and honestly addressed the biggest problem in our economy, the enormous debt overhang in our mortgage market. A few days ago, Mitt Romney was at a forum in Florida talking about foreclosures, and his comments were actually refreshingly honest about our housing and banking...

Cross-posted from New Deal 2.0.

The SEC and the Minerals Management Service's (MMS) share a number of characteristics we can't help but notice in the wake of the worst environmental disaster in U.S. history, which followed the second-worst financial disaster in same. We have endured two cataclysms in...

For those who have spent years investigating fraud, it was no surprise to hear that Goldman Sachs, the (self-described) jewel of Wall Street, is the latest firm to emerge from the financial crisis with tarnished reputation. According to a lawsuit brought by the Securities and Exchange Commission, Goldman misrepresented to...

It doesn't take a rocket scientist -- and certainly not an accountant -- to deduce one thing from the Lehman scandal. The misleading of regulators, investors and the public did not happen in isolation. Like Enron, WorldCom, Tyco, Wachovia, Washington Mutual, Fannie/Freddie, CDOs, Bear, AIG, bond insurers, GM, Chrysler, CIT,...

Cross-posted from New Deal 2.0.

In December, we argued the urgent need to make public A.I.G.'s emails and "key internal accounting documents and financial models." A.I.G.'s schemes were at the center of the economic meltdown. Three months later, a year-long report by court-appointed bank examiner Anton...

After you've read the blog below, we want to hear from you. What questions do you think the Financial Crisis Commission should ask Wall Street's CEOs? We'll be compiling the best questions from our readers and featuring them prominently in the next few days. Leave your questions in...

In a December New York Times op-ed, we called for the full public release of AIG email messages, internal accounting documents and financial models generated in the last decade. Today, a Bloomberg story revealed that under Timothy Geithner's leadership, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York told AIG...

If the senior Wall Street bankers and Washington decision makers who can move billions of dollars with a single conference call want to understand what is truly happening in the economy, they should sit down with small business people like Peter Elliot, the owner of a clothing store in New...

Somebody had to do it.

After months of negotiation and countless attempts at compromise, the Bush administration is still refusing to let New York and other states across the country expand their State Children's Health Insurance Programs (SCHIP). The president is refusing to back down from destructive new...

Sometimes in politics, you think you've seen it all. Turns out I was wrong.

Just when you thought things at the White House couldn't get any stranger, the president has decided it is good public policy to increase the number of uninsured children in our country.

In the...