Long Overdue: Brooksley Born and Sheila Bair honored
March 27, 2009
by Amy Siskind
|
Born and Bair
This week two women who have been frequently featured on this blog were finally given their due (or at part of their due).
Brooksley Born and Sheila Bair were amongst this year’s recipients of this year’s John F. Kennedy Profile in Courage awards. The award is presented by the foundation every year to public servants who have taken courageous stands without regard for personal or professional consequences. Born and Bair were both oracles who had bravely spoken out about factors that lead to our current economic meltdown – as discussed, both of these women were silenced and ignored.
Sheila Bair, who is currently FDIC Chairwoman, warned of the suprime lending crisis. One of the first actions of Treasury Secretary Geithner upon his appointment was to vocalize that Bair was not a team player and try to push her out of office. Fortunately, Geithner did not get his way.
Brooksley Born, while chairwoman of the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission, warned Alan Greenspan, Robert Rubin, and Larry Summers of the risks inherent in not regulating derivatives. Summers was largely responsible for efforts to silence Born.
Isn’t it ironic that the two most powerful persons running our economy, Timothy Geithner and Larry Summers, have something else in common: both sought to silence voices of dissention. Is that the type of leadership that can steer us out of this economic crisis?
In any case, The New Agenda celebrates these two outstanding women. Thank goodness that Brooksley Born and Sheila Bair were finally recognized for their brave, bold and brilliant actions.
This shows that no matter how hard they try, they cannot silence us forever. Congratulations to two extraordinary women.
Well said, Jere!!
A great post to end my day, Amy — Thank you!
This is what I love so much about this site. I would have had to sift through tons of media garbage to find this pearl.
I am a big Sheila Bair fan. Well, well deserved.
Thanks for the article.
Sheila Bair IS grotesquely incompetent and not a team player.
Your defence of her comes down to “she is a woman”.
Oh dear. There are HUNDREDS of women who would do her job better than her.
John
add Alice Rivlin to the list of top female economists who should be front and center working out this Boyz Klub mess.
Ladies – we need you!
Love all of you and respect your work.
Who is regulating OTS/FDIC/SEC?
Please stop the Senate from passing this bill without any stipulation on the use of FDIC’s increased borrowing power up to $500 billion from $100 billion, only needing approval from FDIC itself, the Fed, and the Secretary of Treasury (if Im reading this correctly)-
“During the period beginning on the date of enactment of this paragraph and ending on December 31, 2010, if, upon the written recommendation of the Board of Directors (upon a vote of not less than two-thirds of the members of the Board of Directors) and the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (upon a vote of not less than two-thirds of the members of such Board), the Secretary of the Treasury (in consultation with the President)…”
http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-s541/text
This money needs to be used ONLY for deposit guarantee and bank failures, not for bonds to help banks raise capital, not for Geithner’s “legacy” assets.
DO NOT LET FDIC become AIG; AIG was selling CDS contracts without adequate reserve and this is EXACTLY what is happening with FDIC, when it breached its role to protect deposits and started backing bonds and now potentially toxic assets.
*imho*
Sheila Bair tried to increase bank fees because in a letter to banks she wrote FDIC may be insolvent this year as more failures are expected. In fact, within just a few days Bair made
several contradictory statements regarding FDIC’s potential insolvency and her concern for using taxpayers money as a solution to that
problem. She never mentioned backing “legacy” assets in her request to charge higher fees and for more borrowing power.
March 4, 2009
“No Taxpayer Funds Bair rejected arguments that the agency should use
government aid to rebuild the fund. The FDIC has authority to tap a
$30 billion line of credit at the Treasury Department and legislation
pending in Congress would boost the amount to $100 billion.“Banks, not
taxpayers, are expected to fund the system,” Bair said. Asking for
taxpayer support “could paint all banks with the ‘bailout’ brush.” ”
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/.....refer=news
March 6. 2009
“The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. may reduce an emergency fee on
banks to bolster reserves if Congress expands the agency’s borrowing
authority with the Treasury Department to $100 billion, Chairman
Sheila Bair said”
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/.....refer=news
March 9, 2009
“Bair said the FDIC had enough money in its industry-funded reserves
and was fully backed by the U.S. government. “The money will always be
there,” she said. “We can’t run out of money.”"
http://www.reuters.com/article.....OL20090309
It is ironic that the award people never looked into Bair’s past, because she felt exactly different from Brooksley Born.
“[W]hen Bair was the head of the CFTC, and
there was an intense debate over whether more regulation of
derivatives was needed, here’s what Bair had to say (from an October
1993 Bloomberg article): THE Commodity Futures Trading Commission
(CFTC) has given the US$ 4.8 trillion derivatives market a clean bill
of health, saying that fundamental changes in the way the market is
regulated are not needed…. “We have a strong affinity for
derivatives at this agency,” said acting CFTC chairman Sheila Bair.
“We like them.”"
http://209.85.173.132/search?q.....#038;gl=us
*imho*
While we applaud these courageous women, let’s not forget that our modern financial system has yet to prove itself worthy of the high costs endured by millions of people worldwide. As a fellow female thinker, I’ve always dreamt of trading our TIME (the only real limited resource) for goods and services instead of paper currency or perhaps, devising a simulated “poor class” to better handle the fair distribution of wealth among the living.
I have a great and deep admiration for these two women, both of whom I am meeting for the first time. I was fortunate enough to view the Frontline story on Ms. Born tonight and was overwhelmed at many levels. I believe her and her prophecy. So where to I put my money? I no loner trust the people who run banks, or Wall Street. I no longer trust our government’s ability to protect its citizens. Does that leave me the “mattress”? Or do I need to find a new “home”? When you stop to think, things haven’t really changed much over the last five thousand years outside of the players and how they dress.
D.S.
Leave your Response Want an avatar? Get a gravatar!
Community Room
February 6, 2012 at 4:25 pm
January 30, 2012 at 2:36 pm
January 26, 2012 at 4:38 pm
January 23, 2012 at 1:04 pm
January 15, 2012 at 11:37 am
January 9, 2012 at 6:36 pm
January 7, 2012 at 10:10 pm
January 5, 2012 at 9:31 am
BUILD your NETWORK
Our Network of College Women
Protecting our Teenage Girls
We’re in the Media »
Click to see our latest stories in the media
More Stories »Recent Comments
The Latest from our Blog
Archives
Pioneer Mentors
Blogroll
Find us Online
Subscribe Entries (RSS) | Comments (RSS)
The New Agenda is a 501(c)(4) organization dedicated to improving the lives of women and girls by bringing about systemic change in the media, at the workplace, at school and at home. More...