I am writing today to announce the closure of the Michigan Messenger. After four years of operation in Michigan, the board of the American Independent News Network, has decided to shift publication of its news into a single site, The American Independent at Americanindependent.com. This is part of a shift in strategy, towards new forms [...]
An abstinence-only presentation provided to numerous school districts in Calhoun and Eaton Counties in October of this year provided false and misleading information to students about HIV, experts allege.
Two county registers of deeds filed a class action lawsuit Monday on behalf of Michigan’s 83 counties alleging that the Mortgage Electronic Registration Services owes millions of dollars in property title transfer taxes.
Despite evidence of the impact of mercury on children and public health, Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette last month joined with 24 other state attorneys general in filing a lawsuit to scuttle new EPA regulations that would reduce mercury emissions from power plants.
Rep. McCotter fiddles on the guitar.
As the epic ongoing crisis of the American financial markets developed over the past two years, Rep. Thad McCotter, R-Livonia, was missing in action.
Now as U.S. taxpayers face a staggering $800 billion bill to repair the damage and voters ask who is responsible, Michigan’s attention may turn to the three-term representative from the Detroit suburbs. McCotter is the only member of the state congressional delegation who sits on a committee that deals directly with the financial, mortgage, housing and insurance markets.
A Michigan Messenger investigation has found that, in two years of membership on the House Financial Services Committee, McCotter failed to attend a single committee or subcommittee hearing on topics directly related to the current financial crisis.
As a member of the two most important subcommittees — the Subcommittee on Capital Markets, Insurance, and Government Sponsored Enterprises and the Subcommittee on Housing and Community Opportunity — McCotter paid little attention as the financial hurricane gathered and grew.
He did not attend any of 13 committee or subcommittee hearings for which there are transcripts available on issues directly related to the current crisis. While representatives of the minority party have little opportunity to influence the committee’s work, the hearings offered repeated opportunities for McCotter to hear expert testimony, question witnesses, and stake out policy positions for the benefit of his constituents.
McCotter’s interests seem to lie elsewhere. In the 2007-08 session of Congress, McCotter sponsored resolutions supporting National Dog Bite Prevention Week and the pope’s visit to the United States, and also the establishment of a National Kidney Cancer Awareness Month. He sponsored a resolution to wish hockey star Gordie Howe a happy birthday and submitted a bill to prohibit all government employees from attending the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics.
What he didn’t do was attend the following meetings of the House Financial Services Committee, which he joined in March 2007.
April 16, 2008: Subcommittee hearing on “Examining Proposals on Insurance Regulatory Reform.” 15 members, including 7 Republicans, attended — but not McCotter.
April 16, 2008: Subcommittee hearing on “H.R. 5679, The Foreclosure Prevention and Sound Mortgage Servicing Act of 2008.” 8 members, including 4 Republicans, attended — but not McCotter.
Oct. 30, 2007: Second subcommittee hearing on “Additional Perspectives on the Need for Insurance Regulatory Reform.” 20 members, including 11 Republicans, attended — but not McCotter.
Oct. 24, 2007: Full committee hearing on “Legislative Proposals on Reforming Mortgage Practices.” No McCotter.
Oct. 3, 2007: First subcommittee meeting on “The Need for Insurance Regulatory Reform.” No McCotter.
Oct. 2, 2007: Full committee hearing on “Systemic Risk: Examining Regulators’ Ability to React to Threats in the Financial System.” No McCotter.
Sept. 20, 2007: Full committee hearing on “Legislative and Regulatory Options for Minimizing and Mitigating Mortgage Foreclosures.” No McCotter.
Sept. 6, 2007: Joint hearing of the two subcommittees he’s on about the Homeowners’ Defense Act of 2007. No McCotter.
Sept. 5, 2007: Full committee hearing on “Recent Events in the Credit and Mortgage Markets and Possible Implications for U.S. Consumers and the Global Economy.” No McCotter.
July 25, 2007: Full committee hearing on “Improving Federal Consumer Protection in Financial Services.” No McCotter.
June 26, 2007: Full committee hearing on “A Review of Investor Protection and Market Oversight with the Five Commissioners of the Securities and Exchange Commission.” No McCotter.
June 20, 2007: Full committee hearing on “The State of the International Financial System.” No McCotter.
March 15, 2007: Full committee hearing on “Legislative Proposals on GSE (Government Sponsored Enterprises) Reform.” No McCotter.
In short, McCotter has made no effort to regulate the industries whose massive losses have led to such devastating consequences for the country. Indeed, he scorned the idea of regulation. “Big government doesn’t stop chaos,” he declared in a speech on the House floor last December. “Big government is chaos.”
Where he stands now is hard to discern. Last week McCotter joined a group of 31 congressional Republicans to send a letter to Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke condemning “government interventions to prop up failing private sector companies.” But he also released a statement to the press that called for Congress to “responsibly enact legislation creating a pro-active, 21st Century (sic) regulatory system that brings present stability to our free markets.”
What such a regulatory system might look like is not detailed in his statement, but the letter he signed to Paulson and Bernanke last week indicated that he favors “reforms based on free market principles to restore certainty to our markets.”
McCotter has received approximately $141,000 from banks, insurance companies, real estate and investment firms during the 2008 election cycle, a relatively low figure compared to other members of the Financial Services Committee.
Repeated requests for clarification from McCotter’s Washington office went unanswered, as did questions about his attendance record.
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