| Looks as though Harvey Pitt should quit his position as head of SEC "The government failed, mainly by going limp in its due diligence but also by withdrawing responsibility through legislative deregulation. The one brave exception was Arthur Levitt, Clinton's SEC commissioner, who gamely raised some of these questions, but without much effect because he was hammered by the industry and its Congressional cheerleaders. Corrupt accountants and investment bankers now have a friendlier commissioner at the SEC--lawyer Harvey Pitt, whose firm has represented Arthur Andersen, each of the Big Five and Ivan Boesky, whose fraud case was settled for $100 million. Pitt blames Arthur Levitt's inquiries for upsetting the accounting industry's self-regulation. Given his connections, Pitt should not just recuse himself from the Enron case--a crisis of legitimacy for the SEC--he should be compelled to resign. Similarly sympathetic cops are scattered throughout the regulatory agencies. At the Federal Reserve, a new governor, Mark Olson, headed "regulatory consulting" in Ernst & Young's Washington office. Another new Fed governor, Memphis banker Susan Bies, has been an active opponent of strengthening derivatives regulation. " |
