Benedict Arnold Kristof watch

Just the other day, Kristof backstabbed us yet again with his piece, Mistresses of the Universe, in which he was quite sympathetic to the no-doubt facetious thesis that “the optimal bank would have been Lehman Brothers and Sisters.”  http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/08/opinion/08kristof.html?em

Hey, why let facts get in the way, Nick?  You neglect to mention that, de facto, Lehman was Lehman Brothers and Sisters when it went down.  After all, the Chief Financial Officer of Lehman, itself a financial company whose finances caused it and the global economy to crumble, was Erin Callan. Lehman Sister Callan was demoted after she very publicly downplayed the financial problems at Lehman, taking issue with prescient assertions that Lehman was not valuing its inventory of mortgage-backed securities realistically.  It was at that moment Lehman lost the confidence of the greater investment community, and within weeks, its confidence-dependent business was toast.

Last week, Sister Callan took a leave of absence from Credit Suisse, with whom she landed after leaving Lehman.  Word on the Street is that Callan had a nervous breakdown, http://wallstreetblips.dailyradar.com/story/erin_callan_s_leave_of_absence/  –  just what’s needed on a trading desk.

Callan was not the only high-profile woman on Wall Street in recent years.  Zoe Cruz served as co-Presidentress as Morgan Stanley, and Sallie Krawcheck had served as Chief Financial Officeress of Citigroup.  Lisa Shallett, who as a youth I can personally attest was brilliant, albeit in an entirely masculine way, was CEO of Sanford Bernstein before it merged with Alliance.

When I explored getting back onto the Street in the early 90s, I was told by a former supervisor that the company was only considering women and minorities.  The record number of women holding high-power jobs on Wall Street coincides completely with the worst financial crisis in Wall Street history, a crisis for which all respected commentators agree Wall Street was largely responsible.  Wall Street existed for centuries without women holding powerful positions – within a decade after women climbed to the top, Wall Street, the engine of marked growth in world prosperity since the days of Alexander Hamilton, is virtually gone.

So, it appears, Nick, that you have it entirely backwards.  What was missing as a check on the alpha males wasn’t alpha females – what was missing was regular guys, with balls.  In other words, what was missing was Lehman Brothers, not Lehman Alpha Males or Females.

On that note, I’ll leave you with a great expose on Suze Orman, presumably someone Benedict Kristof thinks would make a great Lehman Sister:  http://articles.moneycentral.msn.com/RetirementandWills/CreateaPlan/stop-listening-to-suze-orman.aspx  Of course, no matter now that Orman has been exposed as a fraud – she can always raise more funds auctioning off her 55 year-long virginity.