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I guess your comment is ambiguous: are you saying that we're being manipulated into paying attention to this instead of the Goldman case? Or that the SEC threw

I guess your comment is ambiguous: are you saying that we're being manipulated into paying attention to this instead of the Goldman case? Or that the SEC threw together a really weak case against an unpopular company ("vampire squid"?) in order to distract from the highly embarrassing facts about what they weren't doing (arresting someone for fraud) and what they were doing (spanking it). Spitzer had unprotected anal sex with whores a whole lot, but that doesn't have much to do with the fact that he bullied companies into settling by conflating illegal practices (e.g. price-fixing on a million-dollar insurance contract) with hard-to-understand industry standards (contingent commissions).

jbooth 17y ago
Well hang on, you're mad at the SEC because employees were slacking on the internet (breaking!) and they weren't going after the systemic fraud in the financial system.. Then you turn around and after a vulgar cheap shot, attack Spitzer for going after systemic fraud in the financial system? I don't get it. Here's the deal: The SEC has no incentive to launch a major bogus lawsuit over a rumored story-of-the-day that has absolutely no legs and that nobody will remember in a couple weeks. Thinking that they do presumes that A) there's an organized political arm of the SEC and B) said political arm is simultaneously smart enough to know about a report like this weeks ahead of time and dumb enough to misjudge this situation massively, damaging their brand worse by launching a bogus lawsuit to distract from a total non-story. A defendant in a major lawsuit, on the other hand, absolutely has an incentive to try and turn the tables by virtue of something like this. The two are not equivalent. EDIT: To clear up my point, I'd have absolutely no problem believing that part of the timing of the lawsuit was pushed by the administration to support the financial reform currently before Congress. That's an incentive that makes sense. "Oh no we were whacking it" does not.
- yummyfajitas 17y ago
  A defendant in a major lawsuit, on the other hand, absolutely has an incentive to try and turn the tables by virtue of something like this. The two are not equivalent. Are you somehow suggesting that back in 2008, Goldman persuaded Sen. Chuck Grassley to demand an investigation into porn watching at the SEC? Somehow, back then, they knew that the SEC would make a press release about a weak case they were planning to file against Goldman? And they somehow managed to ensure that the porn report would come out only a week after the investigation into Goldman was released? And somehow, they also happened to know that the SEC was full of porn watchers who can't wait until they get home? That's quite the conspiracy.
  - jbooth 17y ago
    I suppose I'm saying that Goldman is much better motivated and better equipped to steer the narrative, congressmen and capture various regulators than the regulators are equipped to actually regulate Goldman. If you're going to apply a bias, I'd suggest that one. As far as what I think Goldman's been doing with regard to the SEC, I'd assume that they have several very smart and well-funded people continually looking for opportunities to get leverage over anyone, any way. I wouldn't go so far as to allege they're the ultimate power behind this particular investigation, that could easily be explained by Grassley being a republican, he probably doesn't like the SEC to begin with.
    - yummyfajitas 17y ago
      The problem with your theory is that the SEC, not Goldman (or any other party possibly under the secret control of Goldman), controlled the timing of these reports.
- byrneseyeview 17y ago
  What systemic fraud did Spitzer discover? His cases were all pretty ridiculous--he sued analysts for having second thoughts about their analysis; he went after insurance companies for a commission structure that everyone in the industry was aware of; he went after Dick Grasso merely for getting a large compensation package (one of the reasons executive pay has gone up so much is that the risk of getting sued by someone like Spitzer keeps rising, too). I'm not sure why describing what Spitzer did is a vulgar cheap shot. If he didn't want people to say that he had anal sex with whores, he probably shouldn't have done it. All organizations influenced by politics are to some extent politicized. If you ran the SEC, a taxpayer-funded organization, and you were aware that some stories would come out that made you look bad, you might be tempted to quickly throw together some case that made you look on the ball. They picked synthetic CDOs, which are a couple levels of abstraction away from what your average journalist can explain (much less from what the audience can understand). So you're pimping out non-news for easy outrage, in order to distract from the real news that your organization didn't go after someone whom they had reason to suspect was committing fraud, but did spend time on analsins.com. You're still assuming that Goldman has more information than they had. The SEC said they were going after Goldman; Goldman didn't say that the SEC was full of well-paid porn addicts.

jbooth 17y ago

Well hang on, you're mad at the SEC because employees were slacking on the internet (breaking!) and they weren't going after the systemic fraud in the financial system.. Then you turn around and after a vulgar cheap shot, attack Spitzer for going after systemic fraud in the financial system? I don't get it. Here's the deal: The SEC has no incentive to launch a major bogus lawsuit over a rumored story-of-the-day that has absolutely no legs and that nobody will remember in a couple weeks. Thinking that they do presumes that A) there's an organized political arm of the SEC and B) said political arm is simultaneously smart enough to know about a report like this weeks ahead of time and dumb enough to misjudge this situation massively, damaging their brand worse by launching a bogus lawsuit to distract from a total non-story. A defendant in a major lawsuit, on the other hand, absolutely has an incentive to try and turn the tables by virtue of something like this. The two are not equivalent. EDIT: To clear up my point, I'd have absolutely no problem believing that part of the timing of the lawsuit was pushed by the administration to support the financial reform currently before Congress. That's an incentive that makes sense. "Oh no we were whacking it" does not.

yummyfajitas 17y ago
A defendant in a major lawsuit, on the other hand, absolutely has an incentive to try and turn the tables by virtue of something like this. The two are not equivalent. Are you somehow suggesting that back in 2008, Goldman persuaded Sen. Chuck Grassley to demand an investigation into porn watching at the SEC? Somehow, back then, they knew that the SEC would make a press release about a weak case they were planning to file against Goldman? And they somehow managed to ensure that the porn report would come out only a week after the investigation into Goldman was released? And somehow, they also happened to know that the SEC was full of porn watchers who can't wait until they get home? That's quite the conspiracy.
- jbooth 17y ago
  I suppose I'm saying that Goldman is much better motivated and better equipped to steer the narrative, congressmen and capture various regulators than the regulators are equipped to actually regulate Goldman. If you're going to apply a bias, I'd suggest that one. As far as what I think Goldman's been doing with regard to the SEC, I'd assume that they have several very smart and well-funded people continually looking for opportunities to get leverage over anyone, any way. I wouldn't go so far as to allege they're the ultimate power behind this particular investigation, that could easily be explained by Grassley being a republican, he probably doesn't like the SEC to begin with.
  - yummyfajitas 17y ago
    The problem with your theory is that the SEC, not Goldman (or any other party possibly under the secret control of Goldman), controlled the timing of these reports.
byrneseyeview 17y ago
What systemic fraud did Spitzer discover? His cases were all pretty ridiculous--he sued analysts for having second thoughts about their analysis; he went after insurance companies for a commission structure that everyone in the industry was aware of; he went after Dick Grasso merely for getting a large compensation package (one of the reasons executive pay has gone up so much is that the risk of getting sued by someone like Spitzer keeps rising, too). I'm not sure why describing what Spitzer did is a vulgar cheap shot. If he didn't want people to say that he had anal sex with whores, he probably shouldn't have done it. All organizations influenced by politics are to some extent politicized. If you ran the SEC, a taxpayer-funded organization, and you were aware that some stories would come out that made you look bad, you might be tempted to quickly throw together some case that made you look on the ball. They picked synthetic CDOs, which are a couple levels of abstraction away from what your average journalist can explain (much less from what the audience can understand). So you're pimping out non-news for easy outrage, in order to distract from the real news that your organization didn't go after someone whom they had reason to suspect was committing fraud, but did spend time on analsins.com. You're still assuming that Goldman has more information than they had. The SEC said they were going after Goldman; Goldman didn't say that the SEC was full of well-paid porn addicts.