Which aphorism trumps the other: “takes one to catch one” or “the fox guarding the henhouse”?

One of these days, we’ll find out. But that will be down the road. And, as the recent history which provides the context for this battle of the aphorisms brings home so painfully, finding out down the road can end up being very costly indeed.

Bloomberg reports that the walking wounded from Wall Street are lining up for government jobs:

Underscoring Washington’s appeal as the financial industry shrinks, about 400 finance professionals have signed up for a New York job fair this month featuring nine federal agencies ranging from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. to the FBI and the Securities and Exchange Commission. That’s double the tally at similar events last year, organizers say.
[...]
The job-seekers are among 23,300 people who lost industry work in New York in the year through February as banks worldwide announced almost $870 billion in losses and writedowns. The credit crisis that claimed Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., Merrill Lynch & Co. and Bear Stearns Cos. may cost another 23,000 jobs over the next year, New York City estimates.

It’s one thing for the federal government to hire people with Wall Street experience in good times, when the hirees are more likely to be motivated by public service motivations. At this point, people are motivated by unemployment more than anything else, which doesn’t necessarily make them suitable henhouse guards.

Attendees at the April 24 event will include Virginia Donner, 43, who called a friend at the Federal Reserve after losing her job at a hedge fund in Greenwich, Connecticut. “When you’re looking for work and your industry has kind of imploded, you have to look at what your skills are and then figure out who’s hiring,” she said.

That’s the “any port in a storm” theory of career-shifting. But living is easy with eyes closed, misrepresenting all you see. As SEC chairman Mary Schapiro demonstrates so effortlessly:

“We have a phenomenal opportunity right now to bring in much more current and useful skill sets, with people who have lost jobs on Wall Street and are anxious to do something, and do something very constructive,” Schapiro told Congress during a March 11 hearing.

Virginia Donner doesn’t exactly seem to be motivated by what Mary Schapiro assumes, does she?

Too bad that Schapiro is the lady who we have to count on to make clear-sighted appraisals of what’s going on in Wall Street, both on the surface and behind the facade. (On the brighter side, maybe she’s not stupid, maybe she’s just dishonest. Especially with Congress. After all, there’s a healthy tradition of that, going back at least eight years.)