You may never have heard of Richard Cordray, but you will. He has just been nominated to lead the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. His resume lists his experience as politician, Law clerk and Game show contestant. He has a an excellent record as a game show contestant because he has the distinction of being an undefeated 5-time champion on Jeopardy. He obviously knows a lot of stuff. He likely was an excellent law clerk and appears to have had an average record as a politician, having been defeated about as many times as he was elected.
He does have one redeeming trait that is clearly responsible for his nomination. He campaigned for Obama in 2008 and is a life-long member of the Democratic party. Cordray's education achievements are not to be sneezed at, he was an excellent scholar in school. However, it does not appear that he ever had a private sector job. According to what I read about him, he has never ran a business, has never hired or fired employees, never met a payroll or done any of the things that would help him act in the best interest of consumers. As attorney general, he did sue AIG and Bank of America.
The real dastardly act however is the creation of the Bureau in the first place.When Cordray was appointed enforcement chief for the Bureau, the then current director, Elizabeth Warren, said that his vision and experience would help us build a team that would force every lender in the country would play by the rules. This statement is misleading at best, and seems to infer the lenders were not playing by the rules. However, the lenders were playing by the rules. They loaned money to consumers as fast as the consumers could sign up. The lending rules were set by the Fed. And lest we forget when the lenders had a problem, the Fed bailed them out. The Fed should have bailed out the Lendees too, the consumers. That is you an me. My home has decreased in value by $45,000 changing my retirement outlook a bit. I am waiting for the Fed to send me a check for the $45K, but apparently I am not too big to fail.
The consumers were the people that were left to drown with mortgages in excess of their home value. Too make matters worse, the most optimistic forecasters do not envision an end to this problem before 2016. But the Fed already took care of the lenders. The lenders made billions of dollars. The creation of the Bureau, as a response to the financial crisis, is akin to placing the fox in the chicken house and putting him in charge. The financial slaughter of the previous chickens have already proven the fox does not care about the chickens, or in our case the consumers. It is a little late to close the door, if you know what I mean.
In April 2010, Cordray was responsible for obtaining a settlement from AIG for $9 million fro alleged bid rigging. I suspect they were able to make this payment, if they ever did, from the $185 billion the Federal Reserve gave AIG. And did I mention that Obama made this new Bureau a part of the Federal Reserve.
In my opinion, the best thing that Cordray could do on his first day on the job is abolish the Bureau, in favor of Congress, the people genuinely elected to protect consumers, doing its job.
Obama should decline to run for reelection. It would be the smartest thing he could do. He tried. He failed. Give someone else a chance.
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