Sorry about the video quality as this was taken with my cell phone!

H/T Salon-

In the first exchange, White admitted that “federal prosecutors are instructed by DOJ [that] they have a long line of factors to consider and one of them is the collateral consequences of a criminal indictment to innocent shareholders, employees, or the public.” Unlike Holder, who at least said he was concerned about this radical legal precedent, White insisted that “prosecutors should consider that before proceeding.” In making such an assertion, the prospective head of the SEC was endorsing a radical legal precedent – the one that says justice shouldn’t necessarily be blind, as the venerated axiom goes. Instead, she was arguing that economic consequences for shareholders should be a factor in deciding whether to prosecute lawbreakers.

White then expanded on this view in her subsequent exchange with Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH). She defended the SEC for “consider(ing) consequences in their remedies,” noting that “a corporate fine that in effect would have grievous impact on innocent shareholders is taken into account” when the SEC decides to fine a lawbreaking company. In other words, no matter how bad the crime may be or how much a punitive penalty may be required to deter future wrongdoing, White is arguing that effects on shareholders still should remain a determinative factor in whether the federal government’s law enforcement agencies opt to mete out that necessary punishment.

If that wasn’t bad enough, White then dropped the biggest bombshell of the whole hearing – she admitted to vetting her own prosecutorial decisions through White House economic appointees when she served as a U.S. Attorney. That’s right, she specifically admitted that before deciding to prosecute a financial institution, she contacted Treasury officials Bob Rubin and Larry Summers to find out “whether an indictment of that institution would result in great damage to either the Japanese economy or the world economy.”

[SALON]