Posted on 11/12/2006 8:55:01 PM PST by watsonfellow
Charles Christopher Cox (born October 16, 1952 in St. Paul, Minnesota) has served as Chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) since August 4, 2005. He had served as a Republican member of the United States House of Representatives from January 3, 1989 – August 2, 2005, representing three successive districts in southern California.
During the second term of Ronald Reagan from 1986 to 1988, he served in the White House as Senior Associate Counsel to the President.
From 1977 to 1986, Cox was first an associate and then partner with the international law firm of Latham & Watkins. At the time of his retirement in 1986 he was the Partner in Charge of the Corporate Department in the Orange County office, and served as a member of the firm's national management.
In 1984, Cox co-founded Context Corporation, which produced daily English reproductions of the leading state-controlled newspaper in the Soviet Union, Pravda. The publication was used chiefly by U.S. universities and U.S. government agencies, and was eventually distributed to customers in 26 countries around the world. The company had no connection to the Soviet government.
In 1982–83, Cox took a leave of absence from Latham & Watkins to teach federal income tax at Harvard Business School.
After graduating from St. Thomas Academy in St. Paul, Minnesota in 1970, Cox earned his B.A. at the University of Southern California in 1973, following an accelerated three-year course. In 1977 he earned both an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School and a J.D. from Harvard Law School, where he was an Editor of the Harvard Law Review.
For 10 of his 17 years in the Congress, from 1995 to 2005, Cox served in the House Majority Leadership as Chairman of the House Republican Policy Committee, the fifth-ranking elected leadership position (behind the Speaker, the Majority Leader, the Majority Whip, and the Chair of the House Republican Conference). He was Chairman of the House Committee on Homeland Security, and also Chairman of the Select Committee on U.S. National Security that produced the Cox report, an indictment of Chinese espionage and of security failures at several U.S. national laboratories.
When Congress established the Bipartisan Study Group on Enhancing Multilateral Export Controls through federal legislation in 1999, Cox was tapped as Co-Chairman. The group published a unanimous report in 2001 recommending wholesale modernization of U.S. export controls. In 1994 he was appointed by President Clinton to the Bipartisan Commission on Entitlement and Tax Reform, which in 1995 published a unanimous report warning that the nation cannot continue to allow entitlement programs to consume a rapidly increasing share of the federal budget. Cox also served as Chairman of the Select Committee on Homeland Security (the predecessor to the permanent House Committee); Chairman of the Task Force on Capital Markets; and Chairman of the Task Force on Budget Process Reform.
Among Cox's notable legislative successes is the Internet Tax Freedom Act, a 1998 law prohibiting federal, state, and local government taxation of Internet access and banning Internet-only levies such as email taxes, bit taxes, and bandwidth taxes. With U.S. Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) as his chief co-sponsor, Cox authored legislation in 1997 to privatize the National Helium Reserve, which was then $1.4 billion in debt to taxpayers. As of 2004, this was the third-largest privatization in U.S. history, surpassing the value of the 1988 Conrail privatization. Cox also wrote the only law that was enacted over President Bill Clinton's veto, the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, aimed at protecting investors from fraudulent and extortionate lawsuits.
In 1989, Polish President Lech Wa³êsa joined Cox in a Washington ceremony marking the enactment of Cox's legislation establishing the Polish-American Enterprise Fund. Together with the Baltic-American Enterprise Fund, the Hungarian-American Enterprise Fund, and seven other enterprise funds in Central and Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, the Cox legislation, incorporated in the Support Eastern European Democracy (SEED) Act, matched U.S. foreign aid with venture capital in the newly free countries of the former Warsaw Pact.
Cox is married to the former Rebecca Gernhardt, a Continental Airlines executive and former Assistant US Secretary of Transportation. The two met in the Reagan White House, where she served as Director of the Office of Public Liaison. They have three children.
1) Conservative (check) 2) Reaganite (check) 3) Non Southern (check) 4) From Important State (check) 5) Social Conservative but not a member of the Religious Right (check) 6) Economic Conservative (check) 7) Foreign Policy experience (check) 8) Articulate (check) 9) Able to unify moderates, libertarians, and social conservatives (check) 10) Attractive, personable, and articulate (check)
Seriously, we need to draft Chris Cox for the Presidency.
And best of all, he'll been very loyal to President Bush.
You forgot that one.
Well that's a mixed blessing these days.
He's a heck of a lot smarter than Bush and I think he would do a much better job.
Tell him to go become governor somewhere so he gets some name recognition. Other than that, he sounds great.
Wont win his home State.
I think is alot more recognized than Clinton was in 1990.
I think he would be very competitive in California.
He is exactly what we need.
And he was born in St. Paul which is were the 2008 GOP convention will be!
Bush has more IQ in his little finger than you have in your entire body you moron.
When you've led the Republican Party to three election victories, in some of the most difficult of sitautions, you can then judge his intellect.
I mean, a mental midget could have beat Jimmy Carter, given the situation in 1980, and Mr. Potato Head could have won re-election in 1984.
I think he'd be good. I don't know that enough people outside Orange County, let alone California, would know who he is. That's a steep mountain to climb in the next year or so. If he's interested I think he'd be better off shooting for 2010, either for governor (open seat, Arnold's term-limited) or senator (Barbara Boxer's current seat, no idea if she's running again).
Good idea. I can't think of anyone better than him for 2008.
Was it Lincoln who was the last House member who was elected President? I don't think that any House member has got anywhere near a Party nomination in over 100 years. Other than that little problem I am all in favor. Could be a longshot VP candidate.
I think he likes it where he is, otherwise he should run for Boxer's seat. Only political junkies outside his district know who he is. The average Joe up in Nor. Cal. would say "Who?"
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