Did The SEC Lose Sight Of Its Mission?
An Up-Close Look At A Central Figure In The Economic Firestorm
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Play CBS Video Video Where Was The SEC? Critics are questioning why the Securities and Exchange Commission and its chairman Chris Cox didn't do more to prevent the market meltdown. Sheryl Attkisson reports.
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Video Keeping Your Savings Safe With major banks in turmoil and Wall Street on a roller-coaster ride, many investors are worried about their retirement savings. Ben Tracy talks with two advisers about where investments are safe.
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Video Feds Step In To Rescue Banks After a week of major financial turmoil, President Bush announced a historic bailout for America's banks and admitted the financial system is in crisis. Anthony Mason reports.
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Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson talks with reporters after meeting with Congressional leaders on the current economic crisis Thursday, Sept. 18. At right is Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben Bernanke, 2nd right is Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and second left is Securities and Exchange Commission Chairman Chris Cox. (AP Photo/Lauren Victoria Burke)
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In-Depth SEC Trading Ban Questions and answers about the practices of short selling and naked shorting.
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Timeline Credit Crunch Feeling the squeeze? Here's a look at actions and statements from key players in Washington.
The SEC was created in 1934, during the Great Depression, to protect investors. But in the current crisis, reports CBS News investigative correspondent Sharyl Attkisson, some say the SEC has lost sight of its mission.
A central figure in the economic firestorm is SEC chairman Christopher Cox, seen Friday morning in an appearance with President Bush.
It was less than two hours after Sen. John McCain repeated a call for Cox to resign.
"There needs to be accountability in Washington," McCain said.
President Bush appointed Cox in 2005 to head up the SEC, where 3,400 employees oversee disclosures of 13,000 public companies.
Before Cox, his predecessor at the SEC, William Donaldson, had drawn ire from some fellow Republicans by passing a host of new market regulations.
And during Donaldson's tenure, penalties against violators were on the rise, peaking at $1.5 billion in 2005.
But since Cox took over, penalties have plummeted by two-thirds, to $507 million last year.
Former SEC attorney Howard Schiffman says lax enforcement isn't the problem - it's that the SEC doesn't act quickly enough.
"Here it's not as important to find out who was responsible for the fire, but maybe should have stopped there ever being a fire," Shiffman.
Just two SEC chairmen have ever given up their office abruptly because of political turmoil.
In 1973, Bradford Cook stepped down during a Nixon campaign finance scandal. And in 2002, Harvey Pitt resigned after the Enron accounting fiasco.
Today, Pitt says the bulk of the problems that led to today's crisis are outside the SEC's purview, and that criticism heaped on Cox and the SEC is unfair.
"Christopher Cox has done, in my view, an outstanding job," Pitt said.
In a statement, Cox gives no sign of wavering, saying the SEC has "responded valiantly" and taken many "decisive actions" in the current market crisis.
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See all 147 CommentsPosted by cav_03 at 10:02 PM : Sep 20, 2008
I see the down side of this example, so what can be done to turn this around? Where is leadership most valued--and seldom corrupted by the possibility of a cash windfall?
proposed bailout so the American people know the WHOLE truth. Maybe they don''t understand the ramifications of it!!
What, has everybody forgotten that this Administration POINT-BLANK said that they expected that the various agencies'' interactions with the Public stay "on message"?
Is anybody REALLY stupid enough to think that staying "on message" was limited to press releases?
D@amn...tell me one more time that the media''s talking heads were not making so much money that they preferred to pretend that all was rosy in America!!
Who knows? Maybe if I hear it enough, I will put a HONKING big pair of blinders on, too!!!
Dude, as an ex-combat engineer squad leader I can totally relate (was 1st Cav (Air Mobile) once in another life, too). "Bring ''em home alive" was my prayer every morning and every night (although, they weren''t answered)... but 95% of the people I met, I felt honored to know as a fellow humaan being... the other 5% (could they be the top 5%?) were the cowards who''d say or do anything to save their own skins... their name be neocon.
Bribery and the love of money are all our "leadership" seem to know.
Posted by White-Marsh at 03:48 PM : Sep 20, 2008
THANK YOU for telling THE TRUTH. This all started ON CLINTON''S WATCH, and it happened OVER HIS SIGNATURE.
He could have vetoed it, but he signed it instead.
STOP BLAMING BUSH ALONE. BOTH SIDES ARE TO BLAME.
Posted by dmw1167 at 05:21 PM : Sep 20, 2008
What, you had to SEE IT ON TV to figure this out?????
Isn''t it OBVIOUS that the leading members of Congress ARE some of the FAT CATS getting bailed out?
Why else would there be such immediate and OVERWHELMING agreement from BOTH SIDES OF THE AISLE in Congress?
. . . . . . . .
I THINK THAT EXPLAINS EVERYTHING...
Posted by txgrouch2006 at 08:37 AM : Sep 20, 2008
Great post ~ not sure I agree wholeheartedly, but they certainly did come out of that "me first" generation.
Their role became one of enforcing good PR and policies that are intended to enhance the administration instead of enforcing policies and ethics in a business sector that is known to place GREED far ahead of ethics and common sense.
I know that people don''t want to accept this but our elected officials are eunuchs when it comes to the financial world. There are people at the head of these financial empires that have more power than any government. They also have the advantage of being virtually anonymous. (Can you name anyone in the Bilderberg Group?) They are untouchable and they are the ones controlling the money.
IMPEACH NOW.
The REPUBLICANS are low life scum and big time LOSERS. In November they need to flushed down the toilet, where they belong.
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