John McCain says that if he were pres­i­dent, he would fire SEC Chair­man Christo­pher Cox. From ABC’s Polit­i­cal Radar:

“The reg­u­la­tors were asleep, my friends,” McCain said. “The chair­man of the SEC serves at the appoint­ment of the pres­i­dent. And in my view has betrayed the public trust. If I were pres­i­dent today, I would fire him.”

Just one prob­lem–aside from test­ing the patience of Cox’s con­ser­v­a­tive admir­ers: as pres­i­dent he wouldn’t have that author­ity. More from ABC:

But while the pres­i­dent nom­i­nates and the Senate con­firms the SEC chair, a com­mis­sioner of an inde­pen­dent reg­u­la­tory com­mis­sion cannot be removed by the president.

From time to time, pres­i­dents have attempted to remove com­mis­sion­ers who have proven “uncooperative.” How­ever, the courts have gen­eral upheld the inde­pen­dence of com­mis­sion­ers. In 1935, Pres­i­dent Franklin Delano Roo­sevelt fired a member of the Fed­eral Trade Com­mis­sion and the Supreme Court ruled the pres­i­dent acted unconstitutionally.