Many were caught by surprise when President Obama suddenly recess-appointed Richard Cordray to head the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau while the Senate was still in session. Yet the president’s action is only the latest in a string of events that raise the question: If the CFPB acts without regard to the law from the start, how will it proceed without congressional oversight, insulated as it is, buried deeply within the Federal Reserve?
Once the bureau was created, Obama balked at sending Elizabeth Warren through the confirmation process to become the director. Warren, one of Harvard’s highest-paid professors (now running for Senate in Massachusetts), had championed the CFPB’s creation and was said to be the only person who could kick-start the new regulatory regime.
