Talk:Harvey Pitt

Press release?

This sounds like a press release:

"...an aggressive regulator, going after the greed, excesses and failures rampant in the last decade of the 20th century which surfaced on his watch. He led the SEC in restoring the Nation's securities markets to full operations after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, and instituted a policy of "real time enforcement" to make the SEC's enforcement efforts more effective."

OCNative 10:11, 16 April 2006 (UTC)

This page definitely needs some work. I can't pretend to be qualified to evaluate Harvey Pitt's life work, but he was the fellow who delivered the notorious speech before the CPA's organization implying that aggressive accounting would be tolerated shortly before the collapse of Enron and Arthur Anderson. I'll try to pull together something which acknowledges this without undercutting whatever contributions Harvey Pitt may have made. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Phineas bounderby (talk • contribs) 04:20, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

Yea this sounds like it was written by Pitt himself. Anyone ever watch this Frontline --> http://pbs.gen.in/wgbh/pages/frontline//shows/regulation/ - before he was SEC chairman, Pitt was a lobbyist for the accounting industry. As their lobbyist, he was a key operator in the movement to keep executive stock options off corporate balance sheets. This was shortly before the collapse of Enron, Global Crossing, et al. Then, after he was picked to be SEC Chairman, he continued to stall accounting reforms in Congress and told legislators to take it easy on the industry. As Chairman was worse than a do-nothing! He actually went out after state regulators who were picking up the slack he left by not enforcing the securities laws. (See this story --> http://dir.salon.com/story/news/col/huff/2002/05/07/merrill_lynch/ ) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.113.42.23 (talk) 04:00, 10 June 2008 (UTC)

I recently posted the two links below because I find this article on Harvey Pitt very misleading and biased. He indeed was "the fellow who delivered the notorious speech before the CPA's organization implying that aggressive accounting would be tolerated shortly before the collapse of Enron and Arthur Anderson."

I have ordered the Frontline documentary and am now re-researching Pitt's role in resisting the regulation of the accounting industry. My degree is in accounting and I was a practicing accountant during a period when Harvey Pitt’s immediate predecessor Arthur Levitt was tracking a troubling trend in an increasing number of audit failures. The basic reason was that big accounting firms were seeking to create larger revenue streams and were taking on other roles, such as business and IT consulting outside of their core auditing services. Sometimes the fees they brought in for these services outside of the role of auditing were huge compared to what they were making in audit fees. Hence the conflict of interest and increasing trend in audit failures. Harvey Pitt, if my memory serves me, was the lobbyist for the big accounting firms and fought the attempt to impose further regulation by arguing that they were a professional organization and could self-regulate. Well, we see how the accounting firms ended up in collusion with Enron cooking the books because of lack of regulation and oversight.

As soon as Bush I came in it was out with Levitt and in with Harvey as head of the SEC and on with the mantra of deregulation until Enron hit, at which time he started changing his tune. This article is really misleading when it comes to Pitt’s role in all this I think.

• PBS Frontline: Bigger Than Enron
• PBS Frontline: A Tale of Two Chairmen

Dogyo (talk) 23:16, 26 March 2009 (UTC) Dogyo

Criticism section

I'm going to re-remove the two last paragraphs in this section. The first, beginning "Pitt helped hedge funds and other short-sellers prevent banks from renegotiating mortgage terms in order to help their borrowers avoid foreclosure" is a statement of fact, and needs to be very strongly sourced. The one online ref does not back it up, and the two offline refs are incomplete. We need full citations, with page numbers for this sort of thing. Even then, we would have to credit this to the authors.

The second is a quote from a peice on another person, and falls afoul of WP:WEIGHT. I have no problems with criticisms of this person's actions being part of the article, but they must adhere to WP:BLP. The Interior (Talk) 22:44, 2 May 2012 (UTC)

External links modified

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External links modified

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If we're even allowing living people still, this is lame compared to the large entries for sub-par celebrities. 216.195.89.58 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 12:21, 14 March 2018 (UTC)

Potential Redraft of Biography

Harvey L. Pitt (born in Brooklyn, New York, February 28, 1945) was the 26th chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), serving for eighteen months between 2001 and 2003.

References

History

Pitt graduated from Stuyvesant High School in 1961. He graduated from Brooklyn College with a bachelor's degree in 1965, and from St. John's University School of Law with a JD degree in 1968. He later received the Presidential Medal of Distinction from Brooklyn College in 2003 and an honorary LLD from St. John’s University School of Law.

From 1968 to 1978, Mr. Pitt served on the staff of the SEC, eventually becoming the agency's youngest general counsel in 1975 (at age 30). In between his two tenures at the SEC, Pitt was a senior partner at Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson, where he represented clients such as: Lloyds of London, the New York Stock Exchange, Fortune 500 corporations, and “virtually all the exchanges and investment houses.”

Mr. Pitt was later appointed by President Bush as the 26th chairman of the SEC, serving for eighteen months between 2001 and 2003. Commenting on Mr. Pitt’s appointment, former SEC Commissioner Richard Roberts said, “He’s a solid choice, experienced, hardworking, knowledgeable.” He also commended Pitt for abandoning his “lucrative law practice for a position paying $133,700.” Regarding Mr. Pitt’s appointment, Representative Michael Oxley of Ohio said “He brings unprecedented expertise to the office of chairman, and I’m certain he will share my desire to promote competition, efficiency and capital formation, and to bring the benefits of technology to investors.” Washington officials and industry executives both believed Mr. Pitt’s background made him “well suited” for the position.

References

Notable Accomplishments as SEC Chairman

As the 26th Chairman of the SEC, Mr. Pitt, among other things, oversaw the SEC's response to the market disruptions resulting from the terrorist attacks of 9/11. Mr. Pitt “organized an presided” over the meeting of exchange and brokerages that restarted the markets. For his response he was lauded as a “voice of calm” and was said to “have acquitted himself well, winning accolades all around.” Further, Mr. Pitt was the “architect of the new rule requiring executives of large companies to personally certify their financial results.” Moreover, Mr. Pitt Created the SEC's "real time enforcement" program and led the Commission’s adoption “of dozens of rules in response to the corporate and accounting crises generated by the excesses of the 1990’s.”

References

Criticism

Months into his tenure Mr. Pitt became the target of political criticism when the Enron scandal broke out in October 2001. Critics alleged that Mr. Pitt was the wrong person to deal with this crisis because he had previously represented the accounting profession when he was an attorney in private practice. Despite allegations of Mr. Pitt’s close ties to those he had represented, Mr. Pitt responded aggressively to the WorldCom scandal promising to “clean this mess up,” and stated that “criminal charges may be too good for the people who brought about this mess.” Pitt further rebutted critics and explained that his ties to the private sector were actually a “strength because ‘I know where the bodies are.’”

In July of 2002 Mr. Pitt was once again attacked by detractors who decried a request by Pitt to have the position of the Chairman of Securities and Exchange Commission elevated to a cabinet position and receive a corresponding pay increase. A longtime vocal critic of Mr. Pitt’s, Senate majority leader Tom Daschle said “Of all the things he has to think about, it is amazing to me that this is what he’s spending his time thinking about. I think it makes our point, the point many of us had, that he is not qualified to serve in that position.” SEC spokeswoman Christi Harlan clarified the aspirational nature of Pitt’s request, stating that “the congressional conference ‘asked us for a wish list. And we sent them a wish list.” When testifying before congress Pitt himself stated that “he had to take a 99 percent pay cut to come to the SEC.” Further, scholars have since recognized merit in the proposal, noting that the “path of single regulation was followed by other countries, including Great Britain, Japan, and Germany,” and that “Great Briton appeared to have success with that approach at the time Pitt floated his proposal.”

Despite aggressive critics, many including his predecessor and ideological opponent Arthur Levitt said Mr. Pitt was “being unfairly criticized for a number of things,” and that “he is better than he’s getting credit for.” Supporters expressed that Pitt’s “biggest problem” was being unable to get out the message that he was working to “clean up corporate America.” Further, they pointed to Pitt’s effective operations behind the scenes and how others had gotten credit for Pitt’s initiatives. Former Treasury undersecretary for domestic finance Peter Fisher offered “The kind of stuff Harvey’s been doing is a little arcane. It’s a little hard to put in a sound bite. But it’s the meat and potatoes of this business. That’s why Harvey is the right guy in the right place.”

References

Resignation

Mr. Pitt encountered further controversy during the appointment of former FBI and CIA head William Webster’s to head the newly formed Public Company Accounting Oversight Board, an entity created by congress to audit the accounting industry. The SEC approved Webster in a split decision. It was alleged that Webster divulged to Pitt that he headed the board audit committee of U.S. Technologies, a company being investigated for accounting irregularities and accused of fraud. However, Chief Accountant Robert Herdman cleared Webster for the nomination. Nevertheless, the other Commissioners claimed not to have been told about this apparent conflict. For this misstep, Democratic Senator Paul Sarbanes, Chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, called for Pitt’s resignation and Republican Senators including Mike Enzi (Wyoming), Richard Shelby (Alabama) and John McCain offered criticism. The GAO later issued a report that largely placed blame on SEC staff and not Mr. Pitt.

This dispute ultimately led to Mr. Pitt’s resignation. In his letter of resignation to President Bush Mr. Pitt wrote “Unfortunately, the turmoil surrounding my chairmanship and the agency makes it very difficult for the commissioners and dedicated S.E.C. staffers to perform their critical assignments. Rather than be a burden to your or the agency, I feel it is in everyone’s best interest if I step aside now, to allow the agency to continue the important efforts we have started.”

When Pitt was asked in 2005 if he believed he could have left the SEC on a better note if he had stayed longer, he replied: "I feel I left on a very high note."

References

Other

Mr. Pitt is now the Chief Executive Officer of the global strategic consulting firm, Kalorama Partners, LLC. and its affiliated law firm, Kalorama Legal Services, PLLC.

Mr. Pitt has served on the Board of Directors for Approva Corporation. Mr. Pitt has also taught full-semester courses—in an adjunct capacity—at Georgetown University Law Center, George Washington University Law School, and the University of Pennsylvania School of Law. He has been a frequent guest analyst on CNBC, Fox Business News, Bloomberg TV-Radio, CNN, Reuters, CBS, and ABC.

He also received several professional awards and other formal recognitions including:

• The William O. Douglas Award (2011), conferred by the Association of SEC Alumni annually on an SEC alumnus who has substantially contributed to the development of the federal securities laws and served the financial and SEC community with distinction;

• Induction into the National Association of Corporate Directors Corporate Governance Hall of Fame (2011), recognizing professionals who have provided a lasting and positive influence on corporate governance; and

• Induction into the Securities Docket SEC Enforcement Hall of Fame (2014), in recognition of significant and lasting positive contributions made to the development of securities law enforcement.

Viseditor (talk) 19:03, 7 July 2020 (UTC)Viseditor

References

Place of birth

The text, with an RS ref, indicates that Pitt was born in Brooklyn, New York. An Editor keeps on insisting that the infobox, not reflect what the RS ref states, but indicate instead that his place of birth is New York City, New York. The editor does not provide a link to any Wikipedia rule that supports his insistence. I would ask that he provide that support, or self revert, or be reverted. I had left work on his talk page, but he just kept on reverting. 2603:7000:2101:AA00:310A:BF85:D2C1:631E (talk) 07:51, 2 June 2023 (UTC)

Template:Infobox person, see "Parameters" and "birth_place". You could remove "New York" if you want. --Marbe166 (talk) 08:05, 2 June 2023 (UTC)

perhaps this is a good time to consider the purpose of a rule. We wish to aid the reader. By giving them information, not just as to the country of birth, but a smaller populated area, we seek to impart the information that attends the fact that one grew up in that area. Brooklyn is very large, in terms of population. If Brooklyn were an independent city, it would be the third most-populous in the U.S. after the rest of New York City and Los Angeles, and ahead of Chicago. The suggestion that we ignore all rules is not one that I normally embrace, but it is appropriate here. I submit that it would satisfy common sense.--2603:7000:2101:AA00:69FC:4556:694B:622A (talk) 03:14, 3 June 2023 (UTC)

Thoughts? Also, fyi there is a conversation on the general issue, that started before our discussion, on that template page. --2603:7000:2101:AA00:B827:6A95:E3FF:9B0B (talk) 05:50, 12 June 2023 (UTC)

"Lifelong Republican"

The lede describes him as such. It may well be true, but is not supported there, and does not appear in the text below. Thoughts? 2603:7000:2101:AA00:A97C:8EE:3B5A:B66E (talk) 00:20, 3 June 2023 (UTC)

Controversy section

I think it's fine. It helps the readers. That's a primary goal of all of us. As of October 2022 about 33,000 articles had controversy sections. The tag only mars the article, and unless the editor is going to clean up all those other sections, seems less than helpful. I could see an expansion of the title however. To make it more descriptive. 2603:7000:2101:AA00:B827:6A95:E3FF:9B0B (talk) 05:49, 12 June 2023 (UTC)

Any further thoughts? --2603:7000:2101:AA00:608D:2669:BF18:7D8B (talk) 19:50, 21 July 2023 (UTC)