For years, I felt as if I were the only critic of Wall Street's regulators and their organizations.  Talk about feeling like a lonely prophet cast out into the forbidding wilderness.  Folks kept telling me to hush -- it wouldn't be good for my business.  You don't want to take the big boys on.  Those regulators can get downright nasty.

Unfortunately, I'm one of those ornery guys who if you want to get me to do something, just tell me that I can't or shouldn't do it.  Must be something to do with authority figures and all.  Oh well, too late to retrace those career steps. The funny thing, though, is that all my years of complaining didn't hurt me. To the contrary. 

Just goes to show you. Sometimes, you just have to be that one dolt who stands up in the town meeting, points the finger, and says what everyone else knows is true but lacks the courage to voice. Sure, sometimes they shout you down.  Other times the corrupt sheriff and mayor get the townsfolk to drag you outside and string you up. However, on occasion, what you have to say resonates with many who will listen. Then the equation changes and the balance of power shifts. No---not always.  Hey, this isn't a Hollywood movie with the good guys in the white hats beating the bad guys in the black hats in the final scene.  It's been  film noir for a long time. Bad guys have been wearing the black and white hats on Wall Street.  

Lately, I'm feeling a lot less lonely.  Take Susan Antilla's wonderful jab, jab, and crushing uppercut today at Bloomberg.com.  In her column SEC Finds Whizzes to Bust Wall Street’s Worst: Susan Antilla at http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=email_en&sid=am5HqY.zw2So , she absolutely lambastes the Securities and Exchange Commission for the shenanigans of its own staff -- tossing their weight around and trading stocks, and the like. And in a line that brought tears to this old reprobate's frozen regulatory-reformer's heart, she now picks up my rusty bugle and sounds a blaring clarion's call:

When influential people at the agency can’t follow their own rules, isn’t it just one more reason to consider a whole new regulatory agency?

Welcome aboard, Susan.  Nice to have the company.

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