Did Carmen Segarra Face Retaliation at the New York Fed for Legal Compliance?

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Discussion Overview

The discussion centers around the alleged retaliation faced by Carmen Segarra at the New York Federal Reserve for her adherence to legal compliance. Participants explore themes of regulatory practices, media coverage, and political implications related to the financial crisis and government oversight.

Discussion Character

  • Debate/contested
  • Meta-discussion

Main Points Raised

  • Some participants assert that Segarra faced intimidation and termination for doing her job legally, highlighting a culture of deference within the Federal Reserve towards Wall Street.
  • Others introduce concerns about the IRS's alleged political bias and its implications for private citizens and political organizations, referencing specific figures like Lois Lerner.
  • A few participants express skepticism about the media's coverage of these issues, suggesting a disparity in the scrutiny faced by different administrations.
  • Some argue that the Federal Reserve's actions during and after the financial crisis indicate a broader issue of regulatory failure, while others question the extent of the Fed's role in the economic collapse.
  • There are calls for reducing regulatory burdens on small businesses while enforcing regulations more stringently on larger entities, reflecting a desire for balanced oversight.
  • Participants express frustration over perceived distractions from significant issues, such as the IRS scandal, suggesting that these topics are being conflated or hijacked in the discussion.

Areas of Agreement / Disagreement

Participants exhibit a range of views, with no clear consensus on the implications of Segarra's situation or the broader regulatory environment. Disagreements persist regarding the media's role and the political implications of IRS actions.

Contextual Notes

Participants reference various political and media dynamics without resolving the complexities of the issues discussed. There are indications of missing assumptions regarding the motivations behind regulatory practices and media coverage.

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When Carmen Segarra did her work the way she is legally required to do so, she faced intimidation then ultimately termination.

http://www.propublica.org/article/carmen-segarras-secret-recordings-from-inside-new-york-fed
Inside the New York Fed: Secret Recordings and a Culture Clash

A confidential report and a fired examiner’s hidden recorder penetrate the cloistered world of Wall Street’s top regulator—and its history of deference to banks.

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/536/the-secret-recordings-of-carmen-segarra
http://podcast.thisamericanlife.org/podcast/536.mp3 Just wow!
 
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Even more troubling is the IRS' deference at doing the political bidding of the Obama Administration against private citizens and political organizations not aligned with the Democratic Party. (see Lois Lerner, she of the mysteriously crashing hard drive, lost e-mails, etc.)
 
I agree with SteamKing; there is a pattern of picking and choosing which laws to follow and who they will be enforced against by this administration. I am amazed that the media doesn't get its teeth into this.
 
Vanadium 50 said:
I agree with SteamKing; there is a pattern of picking and choosing which laws to follow and who they will be enforced against by this administration. I am amazed that the media doesn't get its teeth into this.

Wow that was a quick hijacking of the OP. No Press ? Fox News has been all over this like flies on poo.
 
Well, you have Fox News, and then you have ABCCBSNBCMSNBC, which have all provided cover to the administration/looked the other way for some time. You definitely do not see the same adversarial posture which the major media outlets took with the administration of G.W. Bush. Even after it was revealed the Administration was secretly collecting the records of the cell phone calls of various AP reporters, there was a brief flurry of notice and then ... deafening silence, especially since this disclosure occurred in a presidential election year (2012).
 
SteamKing said:
Even more troubling is the IRS' deference at doing the political bidding of the Obama Administration against private citizens and political organizations not aligned with the Democratic Party. (see Lois Lerner, she of the mysteriously crashing hard drive, lost e-mails, etc.)

More troubling?? Nothing could be more troubling that the fact that the fed covered for the bankers during and after the financial collapse. The Fed tapes were released in Sept., but they are coming back again big time. As for the IRS deal,,,get over it. How many hearings have we had now?

Turns out Wall Street banks weren’t the only cause of the 2008 financial crisis, the worst economic collapse since the Great Depression. The Federal Reserve, the nation’s central bank, also played a previously unknown role, and an unusual whistle-blower has the goods to prove it.

The recordings, detailed in an explosive story on Friday by ProPublica and NPR, are a bombshell that sweeps back some of the veil of secrecy surrounding the Fed’s handling of the financial crisis to expose a culture of deference toward Wall Street, institutional paralysis and a culture averse to speaking up and challenging conventions.

http://www.newsweek.com/tapes-show-how-fed-was-soft-goldman-sachs-273685
 
SteamKing said:
Well, you have Fox News, and then you have ABCCBSNBCMSNBC, which have all provided cover to the administration/looked the other way for some time. You definitely do not see the same adversarial posture which the major media outlets took with the administration of G.W. Bush. Even after it was revealed the Administration was secretly collecting the records of the cell phone calls of various AP reporters, there was a brief flurry of notice and then ... deafening silence, especially since this disclosure occurred in a presidential election year (2012).

Parts of that may be true but it could have never crashed the economy. Oranges and apples.
 
We need to reduce the regulatory burden for small businesses and do a better job of enforcing regulations for large ones. I hate to be a pessimist, but I am extremely doubtful that this problem is limited to the fed.

Edit: ABC, CBS, and NBC are mysteriously silent on the issue. The Huffington Post had a link to the story a little ways down on their front page. Fox News had it, but I didn't see it on their home page. It was on CNN, but you had to go looking for it.
 
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edward said:
More troubling?? Nothing could be more troubling that the fact that the fed covered for the bankers during and after the financial collapse. The Fed tapes were released in Sept., but they are coming back again big time. As for the IRS deal,,,get over it. How many hearings have we had now?

IMO, not nearly enough.

The whole of the administration has been busy pointing out squirrels, here and there, to distract the media, and where is the investigation by the DOJ or the Inspector General for the US Treasury? Lois Lerner has lawyered up and taken the Fifth, and the IRS Commissioner is busy doing damage control.
The Commissioner was recently quoted, in testimony before Congress, that agency hard drives continue to crash. It's like, "Dang! There goes another one," has become business as usual at the IRS, which is now not only charged with administering the federal tax code, but also has enforcement and administrative functions relating to the implementing of the Affordable Care Act.

By and large, the IRS has been charged with investigating groups aligned with the political right. What would happen, in some future administration, should the pendulum swing in the other direction, and groups from the political left are harassed by the IRS on orders from the administration? Faster than you could say "chilling effect on free speech" or "Richard M. Nixon", there would be a tremendous hue and cry raised up.

I'm sorry, I understand that a system of taxation is necessary to run a government, but when the administrators of that system take sides politically, everyone's freedom to dissent or to form political associations to make their views known to the government is put at risk, which is unacceptable in a free society.
 
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SteamKing said:
IMO, not nearly enough.

The whole of the administration has been busy pointing out squirrels, here and there, to distract the media, and where is the investigation by the DOJ or the Inspector General for the US Treasury? Lois Lerner has lawyered up and taken the Fifth, and the IRS Commissioner is busy doing damage control.
The Commissioner was recently quoted, in testimony before Congress, that agency hard drives continue to crash. It's like, "Dang! There goes another one," has become business as usual at the IRS, which is now not only charged with administering the federal tax code, but also has enforcement and administrative functions relating to the implementing of the Affordable Care Act.

By and large, the IRS has been charged with investigating groups aligned with the political right. What would happen, in some future administration, should the pendulum swing in the other direction, and groups from the political left are harassed by the IRS on orders from the administration? Faster than you could say "chilling effect on free speech" or "Richard M. Nixon", there would be a tremendous hue and cry raised up.

I'm sorry, I understand that a system of taxation is necessary to run a government, but when the administrators of that system take sides politically, everyone's freedom to dissent or to form political associations to make their views known to the government is put at risk, which is unacceptable in a free society.

So perhaps you should start a thread on the IRS scandal and not hijack this one. I realize that a lot of people are frustrated about the IRS. Yet in comparison to the OP it is still oranges and apples, just more oranges and apples.
 
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