[This week seems the week of the revolt of the upper classes. Maybe the tea bagging emboldened them. Warren was recently on the Daily Show, as well, where she refused to put nationalization off the table. -B.]
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http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0409/21423.html
Bailout overseer draws fire from right
By LISA LERER | 4/19/09 6:49 PM EDT
While the professor is a darling of Dems, Elizabeth Warren has become the scourge of Republicans.
Elizabeth Warren, the Harvard law professor charged by Congress with overseeing trillions in financial rescue funds, has a surprising secret weapon: Dr. Phil.
The outspoken consumer advocate has appeared on Phil McGraw’s show twice to talk about the financial difficulties facing middle-class families. Another visit, Warren argues, could help explain the complexities of regulatory reform to a wider audience.
But this time, families in need of “money makeovers” aren’t the only ones she has to convince.
While the bubbly and brilliant 59-year-old professor is a darling of Democrats, Warren has become the scourge of conservative Republicans, who question her panel’s exploration of more-liberal approaches such as nationalization and bank liquidation.
Financial services lobbyists, who’ve long disliked Warren for highlighting predatory lending and abusive credit card fees, argue that she’s using her post to push her own, anti-industry agenda.
“A number of people wonder if this is the new Warren commission or the congressional oversight panel,” said Wayne Abernathy, executive director for financial institutions policy at the American Bankers Association. “It’s looking more like the former than the latter.”
On Tuesday, Warren will spark controversy once again when her panel questions Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner. The Treasury Department has resisted testifying before the committee for months.
Although Warren credits Geithner with being more transparent than the Bush administration, she still wants detailed information about the department’s overall financial rescue strategy, goals and metrics.
“The role of congressional oversight is to ask the tough questions, to push back on the decisions, to request additional information and to recheck the numbers,” Warren said in an interview with POLITICO. “It’s our job to be cranky.”
But some of that crankiness has wormed its way into the panel itself. Two members, AFL-CIO associate council Damon Silvers and New York State Superintendent of Banks Richard Neiman, signed on to the tepid six-month review of the Troubled Asset Relief Program released by the group last month. The two other members - former Sen. John Sununu (R-N.H.) AND Republican Rep. Jeb Hensarling - voted against the entire report.
"The panel did not reach an agreement on either the economic assumptions underlying strategic choices or on the optimal strategy to pursue," wrote Sununu and Neiman, in a dissenting opinion that raised questions about the report.
The dissenters worried that the alternative approaches presented in the report, including nationalization, management changes and the liquidation of failed banks, implied that the banking system was insolvent and that the current plan was already a failure.
Warren says that the report is the product of interviews with dozens of experts across the political and intellectual spectrum.
“That majority report was based on an understanding that came from many different voices,” Warren said. “I think we write panel reports that reflect a broad spectrum of ideas.”
The lack of consensus has fueled Republican criticisms that Warren is reaching far beyond the original intent of the panel by suggesting regulatory changes.
In private conversations, even some Democrats complain that Warren’s role as a constant Cassandra could undermine already tenuous public support for the bank, auto industry and other financial rescue programs.
The panel specializes in calculating the kinds of scary numbers that the Obama administration would rather not broadcast too loudly.