Start with the most recent news: last week, Sanders announced plans to introduce an interesting new bill, one that’s a direct response to comments made recently by the likes of Eric Holder about the difficulty in prosecuting big banks. Holder said some institutions have grown so large that prosecuting its executives may have a “negative impact on the national economy, perhaps even the world economy.”
This was an extraordinary statement to come out of the mouth of the Attorney General – essentially announcing in advance a disinclination to prosecute a whole class of people. It’s Minority Report in reverse – pre-noncrime. What was even more bizarre was that this wasn’t an inadvertent comment or a slip of the tongue, it was absolutely consistent with comments made by other DOJ officials late last year after the slap-on-the-wrist HSBC (money-laundering) and UBS (rate-fixing) settlements. Worse, after Holder and other prosecutorial pushovers like Lanny Breuer made these comments, there was utter silence from the White House, making it crystal clear that this is a coordinated policy.