about what those financial institutions had been up to. so the question i really want to ask is how tough you are? how much leverage you really have in the settlements and tell me about the last few times you have taken the biggest financial institutions on wall street all the way to a trial. anybody? according to the l.a. times, since the mortgage melt jen down, they ve been offering banks a no press release clause promising the fdic will make no mention of the settlements unless it has to. the government officials charged with regulating banks decided they are not too big to fail in criminal courts but in the court of public opinion.