Who you gonna call? Trust-Busters!

March 5, 2009 by mike.

David Ignatius is absolutely right to be recalling Teddy Roosevelt’s willingness to confront powerful economic interests with the power of the Federal Government to go after trusts and monopolies.

Let’s hope that Mr. Obama and Mr. Geithner are listening. It may be a little tough for Mr. Geithner to really get this message because he is deeply entwined in the very institutions that need to be confronted. Still, hope springs eternal and it is possible that Tim will recognize his responsibilities instead of his origins and potential benefactors.

clipped from www.washingtonpost.com The Right Roosevelt? By David Ignatius Thursday, March 5, 2009; Page A19 There has been a lot of speculation about whether Barack Obama can be another Roosevelt, but I wonder if we’re talking about the right Roosevelt. In fixing the financial crisis, Obama could use a little less of FDR’s affection for economic giantism and a little more of TR’s zeal for trust-busting. A case study for today’s regulators is President Theodore Roosevelt’s response to the financial shenanigans of 1902, when the railroad barons tried to combine the Great Northern and Northern Pacific lines into a huge holding company called Northern Securities Co. Roosevelt wanted to file an antitrust suit to stop the deal. The financiers threatened that the lawsuit would cause a panic on Wall Street, to which TR’s attorney general, Philander G. Knox, memorably replied: “There is no stock ticker at the Department of Justice.”

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