Who knows?   The Boston Globe speculates, though: 

The idea of a Warren Senate run is not new, especially to Globe readers. Last year, Ethan Porter wrote an op-ed for the Globe (and a blog post, earlier, for the site True/Slant) explaining why Democrats desperately need Warren to run for office. Just days after Brown’s surprising win, Porter wrote that Brown’s victory “made clear that voters crave something besides the norm: someone from outside the traditional political structure who can speak to their everyday, bread-and-butter concerns in a credible way. Warren fits the bill.”

Received this from an attorney who has been following the CFPB since its conception:

Regarding whether the Bureau can “operate” without a leader, the answer is almost certainly that it can. But it can’t actually “do” anything, including adopting any regulations, without a Senate-confirmed director. This is so because of the Appointments Clause of the Constitution (Article II, Section 2, Clause 2), which empowers the President to appoint certain officials only with the advice and consent of the Senate. An interesting little-known fact about the Bureau is that, unlike nearly every other federal agency, there is no provision in its enabling statute for an under-boss who is also confirmed by the Senate. That means that, if the actual director is disabled, the Bureau will be, too.

The Clarion-Ledger in Mississippi makes confusing remarks in an editiorial today. First:

As this newspaper has noted in the past, payday lenders are legal businesses whose practices are as old as commerce itself.

Then:

But Mississippi legislators know the pitfalls of payday lending and they know that in 1998, they created the loophole that raised maximum legal interest from 36 percent to the 572 percent equivalent.

Has payday lending been around since dinosaurs or since 1998? The answer is this lending has been around for years, and in 1998 the state passed strong regulations that are in place now. Never before then or ever has there been a payday loan made for 36 percent – which is an arbitrary number that ignores the short-term of these loans. This and the regulations that payday lenders follow are largely ignored by the press and critics.

Opponents of payday lending are putting out false statistics in Kentucky:

Recent data suggests that an average $350 payday loan ends up costing more than $800 once fees and interest are added, proponents of the cap say, because the loan is typically rolled over eight times.

There is more fertilizer in that sentence than on any farm in Kentucky. There are no rollovers in the state. There is no way you can legally pay that much for a $350 loan. You can take out more than one loan in a year, just like you can take out other forms of credit, but that requires you borrow additional money before paying another fee.

New rules in Wisconsin are being interpreted by lawmakers.

A new state law that restricts payday loans took effect January 1st – but it’s still not fully implemented, because officials cannot agree which lenders are affected.

The Huffington Post story two posts below says the CFPB can’t operate after July 21 without a permanent director.  This Wall Street Journal story says it can.

The Left-wing Mother Jones magazine doesn’t like the oversight role of Congress.  From the story: 

You knew this was coming. Rep. Randy Neugebauer (R-Tex.), the new oversight chief on the House financial services committee, sent a letter on Tuesday to Elizabeth Warren, who runs the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, grilling her on the bureau’s plans while slamming the bureau altogether.

This story is so overblown, it’s hard to say anything except this reporter  is making a mountain out of a mole hill.  There will be a CFPB head and we will be regulated.

From the news release: 

“We are surprised to learn that military financial counselors are reporting that some payday lenders may be making loans in violation of the terms and rates imposed by law. We are certain that no reputable payday lenders, especially among the 60 percent of the industry represented by this association, make illegal loans. CFSA member companies do not make any type of loan to military personnel that exceeds a 36 percent APR and lenders in violation of the federal law should be held accountable.”

Missouri lawmakers are working on a bill regarding payday lending that won’t shut the industry down. A payday lending rep found one snag in the plan:

Lobbyist Randy Scherr, who represents United Payday Lenders of Missouri, said the bill likely to emerge from the working group will be one the industry can live with but likely will include provisions that are impractical.

A cooling-off period is not popular with the industry, Scherr said. Industry studies have shown it doesn’t change the behavior of borrowers.

“Nowhere else” in the lending industry “is somebody prevented from borrowing money,” he said.

What would happen if the government wanted to limit the number of credit card, debit card or ATM transactions a person could have? Uproar.

Lawmakers do appear to be on the right track by looking for a compromise that won’t take away consumer credit and close payday lending businesses.