The U.S. economy continues to have a hard time recovering from the biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression. So the last thing one would expect the U.S. government to do is to engage in policies that open the floodgates to severe risks in financial markets once again. Yet, that is precisely what's going on.
For all the attention that is paid to the Federal Reserve's "tapering," what Washington has in its crosshairs is something quite different. It is putting massive pressure on the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and the Security and Exchange Commission (SEC). Unless concerned policymakers and the public at large act quickly to counter that pressure, the disastrous past — a financial industry running amok — may well be in the future of not just the United States but also the world.
How is this even possible?