Wall Street's irresponsible behaviorist

Bob Rubin’s Washington Reign Reaches 20 Years

By William D. Cohan - Jan 20, 2013, Bloomberg

We are fast approaching an important but underappreciated anniversary: Robert Rubin’s 20th year of extraordinary proximity to political power in Washington. This is not a milestone to be celebrated.

Not only was Rubin secretary of the Treasury under President Bill Clinton, but the next three secretaries in Democratic administrations -- Lawrence Summers, Tim Geithner and (assuming he is confirmed) Jacob Lew -- have Rubin’s fingerprints on them. This is a cause for grave concern -- assuming, of course, you care about whether it’s right for Rubin to have such a long stretch of political influence.

I do, and here’s why: When Rubin was an arbitrager at Goldman Sachs Group Inc. in the 1980s, and again when he was in the executive office of Citigroup Inc. (C) in the 2000s, he was one of the leading purveyors of the kind of irresponsible behavior that led to the financial crisis of 2007 and 2008. Not only has Rubin refused to take a shred of responsibility for his actions, but he has also managed to win the hearts and minds of two of our last three presidents. That’s no mean feat, and it says much about the cozy relationship between Washington and Wall Street.

Rubin comes by his interest in political power honestly. His maternal grandfather, Samuel Seiderman, was a big part of the Democratic machine in Brooklyn a century ago. Seiderman was “a lawyer, an investor in real estate, a political activist, and a major figure in his Brooklyn world,” Rubin wrote in “In an Uncertain World,” his 2004 memoir. “Family legend has my grandfather and his colleagues sitting around in the basement of what I remember as their enormous house at 750 Eastern Parkway and choosing judges.”

(More here.)