Judges Take Action While Regulators and Lawmakers Debate
September 8th, 2009 | 
Author: There is an interesting article at Bloomberg.com that discusses how judges have taken the lead in punishing Wall Street for actions that have contributed to the first global recession since WWII, while regulators and lawmakers argue and discuss regulatory reforms designed to prevent future crises. I view this as a positive development as a history of light sentences in “country club” prisons did little to dissuade illegal activity that can make millions for financial executives. This can provide significant protection for consumers, providing that judges do not take it too far. It is important to ensure that ‘the punishment fits the crime.’
This reinforces my belief that rigorous enforcement of existing regulation would be more effective than the introduction of a huge dose of new regulations.
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I agree wholeheartedly that actually enforcing existing laws is the key to keeping fraud outside the systems. It continually amazes me that laws passed in the 1930’s and early 1940’s continually come up in sentencing and convictions, pointing towards affective and intelligent regulations and laws from our legislature back then.
In reality there needs to be a greater separation between regulators and those they regulate. As the article attests, taking money and lobbying out of the equation would solve the issue completely but that is a whole different conversation.