The proposition that perhaps
Wall Street shouldn't be the first place President Obama turns to to find someone to regulate Wall Street seems simple enough. It was to Sen. Elizabeth Warren when she decided to lead the charge against investment banker Antonio Weiss becoming the third-ranking Treasury Department official, and mobilized other Democratic senators and the progressive community to oppose his nomination. That opposition paid off, and Weiss has
withdrawn his nomination. But don't worry too much about him, he landed on his feet.
"I am writing to request that the administration not re-submit my nomination," Weiss wrote in the letter to Obama, which was obtained by POLITICO. "I do not believe that the Treasury Department would be well served by the lengthy confirmation process my renomination would likely entail."
Instead, Weiss has accepted the position advising Lew on domestic and international issues, which "will allow me to begin serving immediately in support of the Administration's efforts to foster broad-based economic growth and ensure financial reform that protects consumers and reduces the likelihood of future financial crises," he wrote.
The news, of course, has resulted in a flurry of attacks on Warren.
"It's really a shame" said Tony Fratto, partner at Hamilton Place Strategies and a Treasury and White House official under President George W. Bush. "It's embarrassing for the Obama Administration. Terrible for Treasury—including the eventual under secretary, who will have the preferred nominee in the building. It’s terrible for Weiss, to leave his career behind and not get the job. The things we put nominees through only to be upended by ill-informed, myopic demagoguery. The White House should have fought for him."
That's rich, coming from one of the officials who oversaw the worst economic crisis the nation has faced since the Great Depression, caused by a banking industry he and his fellow Treasury officials failed to regulate. Which is the whole problem that Warren was trying to point out with her opposition. Somehow that lesson hasn't seemed to sink in, and the story has become much more about
"Queen Elizabeth" who is now President Obama's "nemesis."
Fine. Warren is making all the right enemies in her ongoing fight to be Main Street's champion.