The Audacity of These Women

Credit Slips' Elizabeth Warren is on the cover of Time this week, along with Sheila Bair of the FDIC and Mary Schapiro of the SEC. In The New Sheriffs of Wall Street, Michael Scherer describes how a new crop of female sheriffs are attempting to impose law and order on the testosterone-driven chaos of Wall Street. Obviously, this is a welcome change. At a time when the word "outsider" has been overused to the point of meaninglessness, women really are outsiders in the financial industry. And this group has risen to prominence as it has become increasingly clear that we need financial experts who don't view the world through a narrow, Wall Street lens.

At the same time, though, I wonder if an equally appropriate headline might have been, "Women Brought in to Clean Up Mess Made by Men." This is particularly striking at the SEC, where a pornography problem among senior staff threatened to undermine the entire agency. It got so bad that the New York Times ran a blog post entitled Will Wall Street Be Saved By Porn? With that in mind, it may well have occurred to Obama that the best way to save the SEC from itself was through the appointment of a fully-clothed woman.

Comments

[CathyG]

Brooksley Born should have been on the cover for her reform activities, also.

[Angie Littwin]

I completely agree.

[Patches]

So stoked to see Liz Warren.....everywhere! Morning Joe, Nightly news, Daily Show...etc..........

[MattJ]

Amazing; how does Mary Schapiro, who headed the financial industries' self regulatory body, get credit as an outsider and a tough regulator? It is to laugh.

[Angie Littwin]

Well, she was only made Chair in 2009, after the bubble had burst. And the SEC is *supposed* to be an actual regulatory body. We'll see if she can make it happen.