Thursday, October 23, 2008
The Obama campaign: A material weakness in internal controls
As a chief financial officer and student of Section 404 of the Sarbanes-Oxley law, I have both a practical and a philosophical interest in "internal controls" over financial transactions. It fascinates me that one presidential campaign -- John McCain's -- appears to have adequate internal controls in place to prevent purely fraudulent campaign donations, and the other -- Barack Obama's -- does not. Is it out of line to wonder whether his campaign's casual regard for controls will extend into Barack Obama's White House?
3 Comments:
By 
Kinuachdrach, at
Thu Oct 23, 08:44:00 PM:
"his campaign's casual regard for controls"
That's a very nice way to put it. From some of the reporting, it seems more like a deliberate policy.
The real issue is not Obama's casual treatment of the law. It is his secure knowledge that his fellow Democrats in Congress & the media will turn a blind eye.
By so doing, they are destroying the concept of a nation governed by laws. And the long-term consequences of that will likely be as negative for Obama & the Democrats as for al the rest of us.
By 
, at
Thu Oct 23, 10:10:00 PM:
He might get an adverse opinion on ICOFR but he gets an unqualified opinion on his financial statements.
Oh, did i just use Obama and Unqualified in a sentence?
Am i a racist now?
By , at
Fri Oct 24, 09:17:00 AM:
Why not call this what it is? Why all this make-nice dancing around, describing the disablement as "a casual regard for controls", when in fact it is a highly disciplined regard for controls. Or at least for the circumventing of all controls, until November 5 dawns, at which time it won't matter any more. Kim Crawford strikes just the right note.
