Is It All About The Election?

'It' is the pressure on Eric Schneidermann, NY Attorney General, to agree to the settlement the attorneys general of the other 49 states have made with the sellers of mortgage-backed securities (MBS). 'The Election' refers to the presidential elections of 2012. Matt Taibbi thinks they are related. His take on the matter is that Obama and the other attorneys general are willing to settle for peanuts while preventing any further prosecutions of the MBS charlatans who bear a considerable amount of the blame for our current financial woes.

Taibbi is particularly incensed at this comment by Kathryn Wilde, a member of the Fed board who is charged with representing us: "It is of concern to the industry that instead of trying to facilitate resolving these issues, you seem to be throwing a wrench into it. Wall Street is our Main Street — love ’em or hate ’em. They are important and we have to make sure we are doing everything we can to support them unless they are doing something indefensible." (emphasis added). In the eyes of most rational observers not affiliated with the financiers, these companies have done indefensible things - stealing and fraud bring some of these things.

Taibbi ends the article as follows:

"My theory is that the Obama administration is trying to secure its 2012 campaign war chest with this settlement deal. If Barry can make this foreclosure thing go away for the banks, you can bet he’ll win the contributions battle against the Republicans next summer.

Which is good for him, I guess. But it seems to me that it might be time to wonder if is this the most disappointing president we’ve ever had." Is Obama the most disappointing president we've ever had? It's certainly looking that way.