It is true that a simple reversal of Citizens United would not be the perfect legal solution. It could be at least a major change in attitudes in peoples' tolerance for dark money influence on the few holders of the levers of power, though.
Laws and Regulations are hard to change fast enough to keep up with those clever enough to find new…
It is true that a simple reversal of Citizens United would not be the perfect legal solution. It could be at least a major change in attitudes in peoples' tolerance for dark money influence on the few holders of the levers of power, though.
Laws and Regulations are hard to change fast enough to keep up with those clever enough to find new ways to cheat, at least without responsible regulators to able be flexible enough to adjust to the spirit of the most import basic aims of such.
I think I remember mostly his regret that a lot of irresponsible and incompetent risk takers with other peoples' money entered the field. He wanted to see innovators enabled but saw too many at least irresponsible new people take over a large portion of the financial markets. I think I understand enough about the old style derivatives to appreciate the following from the article above:
"...“In derivatives,” says Weill, “we should have an exchange, where you can have a mark-to-market, a place where they can trade, so that you don’t have a problem that can build up over multiple years, and all of a sudden you see a big collapse. If it was marked to market every single day, you'd be able to protect the balance sheets of the different companies.
The world has changed
Does Weill regret what he did at Citigroup? Not really. Weill says that the megabanks were right for their time but the world has changed.
As a result of too much concentration of investments, too much leverage, not enough transparency with a lot of off-balance-sheet items, we had the meltdown of 2008 and trust in the financial system was broken. This has led to efforts to regulate everything in the financial sector, including futile efforts to distinguish market-making trading from proprietary trading. Weill believes that these efforts will continue and in the end will stifle creativity in the financial sector. Instead, the sector should take another route and allow regulation of commercial banking and separate that from investment banking, where creativity and leadership can prosper..."
I have to do some more homework to try to show similarities in what can go wrong when Dark Money hides too much incompetence and evil. I'll start with reading all of Cathy O'Neil's "Weapons of Math Destruction." My initial assumption is that she found amazingly incompetent assessments (or attention to), risk management. Those blindly seeking quarterly profit seem too encouraged by those who do not want their methods and aims revealed, as seems indicated by the following: "...As O'Neil defines it, a weapon of math destruction, or WMD, has three elements: Opacity, Scale, and Damage. Combined, these factors create traps with feedback loops, capturing victims in systems they can't understand and can't escape, all the while exploiting them..."
It reminds me of something my great grandmother told me (which I took to be a warning about hero worship).
She said, "Before you compliment the marksman, ask what the target was."
All dollars can be spent for whatever, but not all dollars are earned from the same sorts of efforts. Great sums can be amassed form all manner of scams, legal ones or not, and not all things should be for sale. It is reasonable for society to regulate theft, be it hard or soft, (it's still theft) and bribery, be it explicit or de facto. If political outcomes can be purchased or excessively influenced by the intervention of money, that is patently and fundamentally anti-democratic. No? It's batdoo crazy the extent to which we allow blatant conflicts of interest and massive dollar "doping" (think of the Olympics) to significantly skew governmental outcomes.
It is true that a simple reversal of Citizens United would not be the perfect legal solution. It could be at least a major change in attitudes in peoples' tolerance for dark money influence on the few holders of the levers of power, though.
Laws and Regulations are hard to change fast enough to keep up with those clever enough to find new ways to cheat, at least without responsible regulators to able be flexible enough to adjust to the spirit of the most import basic aims of such.
An example: I recall Sandy Weill, the biggest supporter of doing away with Glass-Steagall, coming out as regretting his success in getting it overturned. See https://www.forbes.com/sites/stevedenning/2012/07/25/rethinking-capitalism-sandy-weill-says-bring-back-glass-steagall/?sh=645e9ed137d5
I think I remember mostly his regret that a lot of irresponsible and incompetent risk takers with other peoples' money entered the field. He wanted to see innovators enabled but saw too many at least irresponsible new people take over a large portion of the financial markets. I think I understand enough about the old style derivatives to appreciate the following from the article above:
"...“In derivatives,” says Weill, “we should have an exchange, where you can have a mark-to-market, a place where they can trade, so that you don’t have a problem that can build up over multiple years, and all of a sudden you see a big collapse. If it was marked to market every single day, you'd be able to protect the balance sheets of the different companies.
The world has changed
Does Weill regret what he did at Citigroup? Not really. Weill says that the megabanks were right for their time but the world has changed.
As a result of too much concentration of investments, too much leverage, not enough transparency with a lot of off-balance-sheet items, we had the meltdown of 2008 and trust in the financial system was broken. This has led to efforts to regulate everything in the financial sector, including futile efforts to distinguish market-making trading from proprietary trading. Weill believes that these efforts will continue and in the end will stifle creativity in the financial sector. Instead, the sector should take another route and allow regulation of commercial banking and separate that from investment banking, where creativity and leadership can prosper..."
I have to do some more homework to try to show similarities in what can go wrong when Dark Money hides too much incompetence and evil. I'll start with reading all of Cathy O'Neil's "Weapons of Math Destruction." My initial assumption is that she found amazingly incompetent assessments (or attention to), risk management. Those blindly seeking quarterly profit seem too encouraged by those who do not want their methods and aims revealed, as seems indicated by the following: "...As O'Neil defines it, a weapon of math destruction, or WMD, has three elements: Opacity, Scale, and Damage. Combined, these factors create traps with feedback loops, capturing victims in systems they can't understand and can't escape, all the while exploiting them..."
It reminds me of something my great grandmother told me (which I took to be a warning about hero worship).
She said, "Before you compliment the marksman, ask what the target was."
All dollars can be spent for whatever, but not all dollars are earned from the same sorts of efforts. Great sums can be amassed form all manner of scams, legal ones or not, and not all things should be for sale. It is reasonable for society to regulate theft, be it hard or soft, (it's still theft) and bribery, be it explicit or de facto. If political outcomes can be purchased or excessively influenced by the intervention of money, that is patently and fundamentally anti-democratic. No? It's batdoo crazy the extent to which we allow blatant conflicts of interest and massive dollar "doping" (think of the Olympics) to significantly skew governmental outcomes.
She said, "Before you compliment the marksman, ask what the target was."
Solid advice.