Consequently the business climate in the United States has turned sour. The business climate in places like London is less risky, and IPOs that might have been issued here are now issued in London. The London Stock Exchange markets itself as "A Sarbanes-Oxley Free Zone." London is prospering, a businessman told me the other day, because of North Sea oil and "Sarbanes-Oxley, which has encouraged Americans to take their IPOs here."
Unfortunately, Washington's campaign against white collar crime has not ingratiated us to our most loyal ally. Our Justice Department is now pursuing three British bankers who allegedly defrauded a British bank. The evidence against them in Britain is insufficient to prosecute them according to British law, and they are free here. But our Justice Department argues that they were part of the Enron scandal and is extraditing them to Texas -- an instance of prosecutorial rapaciousness that has made headlines here for a week and created growing enmity against us. The reason for the enmity is that the Justice Department is extraditing the Brits by a 2003 extradition treaty that was reserved for terrorists and that Washington has not even signed.
As you read this the anger against Washington grows in London. The three British bankers face as much as two years in a Texas prison without bail before they go to trial because they fought extradition. Thus, even if they are eventually found innocent their lives are ruined. Tension is also growing as the British newspapers are calling on the government to take last-minute measures against flying the men to Texas. Now comes word that another British banker who was questioned by the FBI about his three indicted colleagues has committed suicide. The bad feeling against us is bound to grow.
The bad feeling comes from the left, for instance, the Guardian. And it comes from the right, from America's friends at the Telegraph newspapers and the British Spectator. Washington's obsession against white collar crime has at least been a unifying force in British politics. They are all mad at us.