How to Win Friends And Influence Regulators

Ultra-liberal U.S. Senator Alan Cranston (D., Calif.) and arch-conservative businessman Charles Keating joined hands three years ago to help create the savings-and-loan debacle, the biggest congressional scandal of this or any season. Now, as the S&L cost mounts by the hundreds of billions and elections approach, they are doing what comes naturally. They are going on the attack.

Senator Cranston stumped California in mid January to denounce his main accuser as a “liar.” One of these lies, said the Senate Majority Whip, was the notion that he and the other “Keating Five” senators—Dennis DeConcini (D., Ariz.), John Glenn (D., Ohio), John McCain (R., Ariz.), and Donald Riegle (D., Mich.)—who met privately with government savings-and-loan regulators in 1987, had in any way delayed the closing of Charles Keating’s Lincoln Savings and Loan. (When the government finally did seize Keating’s thrift in April 1989, the cost to the taxpayers was put at $2.5 billion.) Cranston’s denials apparently have had some effect on none other than ABC’s Sam Donaldson. In an episode of Prime Time Live rehashing Keating’s million-plus in political contributions to Cranston et al., he concluded the money didn’t affect the regulators’ conduct toward Keating.

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James Ring Adams

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Ultra-liberal U.S. Senator Alan Cranston (D., Calif.) and arch-conservative businessman Charles Keating joined hands three years ago to help create the savings-and-loan debacle, the biggest congressional scandal of this or any season. Now, as the S&L cost mounts by the hundreds of billions and elections approach, they are doing what comes naturally. They are going on the attack.

Senator Cranston stumped California in mid January to denounce his main accuser as a “liar.” One of these lies, said the Senate Majority Whip, was the notion that he and the other “Keating Five” senators—Dennis DeConcini (D., Ariz.), John Glenn (D., Ohio), John McCain (R., Ariz.), and Donald Riegle (D., Mich.)—who met privately with government savings-and-loan regulators in 1987, had in any way delayed the closing of Charles Keating’s Lincoln Savings and Loan. (When the government finally did seize Keating’s thrift in April 1989, the cost to the taxpayers was put at $2.5 billion.) Cranston’s denials apparently have had some effect on none other than ABC’s Sam Donaldson. In an episode of Prime Time Live rehashing Keating’s million-plus in political contributions to Cranston et al., he concluded the money didn’t affect the regulators’ conduct toward Keating.