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Follow the Money If the question hinges on whether Warren can say exactly how TARP money has been spent so far, then the answer is probably no - but then that may be an unrealistic goal. The eight monthly reports released by the oversight panel to date spend almost more time talking about what isn't known than about what is. They repeatedly assert that the Treasury Department and the Federal Reserve should be more forthcoming...
...panel has been plagued by controversy, which has also hampered its effectiveness. Its two Republican members complain that the panel has drifted away from its core mission under Warren's leadership and spends too much time editorializing on the plight of middle-class families, the focus of Warren's academic research. Her relationship with Treasury has been rocky. She got into a low-level war with former Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and his staff over their perceived unwillingness to share information, and she had a shaky start with Geithner, who didn't seem to take the panel seriously at first...
...past. She argues that now, finally, taxpayers "have a seat at the table." If this sounds like advocacy, that might be exactly what Democratic Party bosses had in mind when they selected her. Since a special inspector general was also appointed to investigate Treasury's actions, Warren's oversight panel was left with little actual power. But it performs a much more public function. Though some of the panel's reports have been less than revelatory, there have been some worthy and newsmaking insights, like the suggestion that for every $100 Paulson spent buying stakes in troubled banks, the government...
Warren's concern for the middle class is the prism through which she sees every economic indicator. It is also the driving force behind her work with the oversight panel. The first two reports it issued, in December and January, criticized Paulson's department for its lack of transparency and argued that its policies were doing little to help reduce home foreclosures or alleviate stress on families. Even if accurate, those early pronouncements did not help to pave the way to a functional working relationship between Warren and the people she was supposed to oversee. Former Treasury officials seem...
Warren's dealings with Geithner hit some bumps early on too. After he took office, the panel requested for months that Geithner testify before it; he ignored the request at first but eventually relented. "The most generous interpretation would be that he was staggeringly busy, and to be well prepared for a hearing takes time," Warren says of Geithner, who testified in April. "The less generous interpretation would be that ... we were not on the best of terms." She insists that things are now going more smoothly...