It’s Always Politics

Finally, the Obama administration through Eric Holder says it will get around bringing cases against financial firms that committed wrongdoing in the run-up to 2008:

"Anybody who's inflicted damage on our financial markets should not be of the belief that they are out of the woods because of the passage of time," Holder said in an interview with the Journal on Tuesday.

Why does this smell so much of politics?

Wall Street money helped fund Obama in 2008 and 2012.  This likely would not have happened without a wink-wink on prosecutions.

Now that Obama has no more elections ahead of him, perhaps he is looking to score points with the Democratic Party base.  This would help.

It will all come together late enough in his term that his administration will not bring these cases to final resolution, leaving the cases open for the next president.

In the 2016 election, both major-party candidates will give the wink-wink to Wall Street, and the cases will slowly fade away as the campaign funds come pouring in.

Such is life in an advanced democracy.

In any case, I am not a big fan of federal prosecution.  Why not just leave these financial firms to compete in a free market?  That would bring swift justice.

End the Fed.