Still, in some areas the Democratic administration has made tougher calls than its predecessors. There is clear evidence that Obama has been willing to take positions that Wall Street doesn’t like, such as regulating derivatives and supporting a consumer financial-protection agency, said Barbara Roper, director of investor protection for the Consumer Federation of America. “There’s a lot in there that Wall Street and the big banks hate,” said Roper. The plan is now in draft legislation form, and Congress is expected to take it up in the fall.

Even so, the approach that the administration is taking to the crisis does seem to be shaped by its finance-industry alumni, Roper says. “Wall Street isn’t dictating their agenda, but there’s an absence of other voices,” she said, notably those of consumer advocates and progressive economists and others who might favor helping Joe Overextended Mortgage-holder.

One of the biggest frustrations for the nonmajor shareholders is the Obama administration’s failure to take a strong stand for “cramdown” legislation, a measure supported by Congressional Democrats that would have given bankruptcy judges the power to reduce the principal on primary mortgages so that homeowners could avoid foreclosure. The proposal failed amid furious opposition from business and legal groups that argued the bill would have given judges too much power to rewrite legal contracts, thereby undermining confidence in the law and driving capital out of the markets.

Many Obama supporters blame the administration for failing to put its weight behind the issue. “They clearly put no energy into pushing for cramdown,” said Baker. “We know they have a lot of people that are closely tied to Wall Street. Whether that is the reason for them not pushing for cramdown, I can’t say, but it would be a reasonable thing to infer.”

K Street’s lobbyists, as usual, are happily finding ways of profiting from the chaos by leveraging their insider contacts for their corporate clients. Last month, an invitation from powerhouse lobbying firm Quinn Gillespie & Associates offered finance-industry lobbyists a chance to have a private morning meeting with Fred Baldassaro, the new senior adviser in the office of business and public liaison at the Treasury Department.

The text of the invite, published in the Washington Post, offered an “off-the-record opportunity to meet him and discuss the current financial landscape, including how the new ethics rules work; the staffing situation at Treasury; and the legislative priorities of the department.”

The finance-industry breakfast was subsequently canceled. Consumer advocates, on the other hand, have broken bread with Geithner and other senior officials, said Roper, who attended one such dinner in May. “They have made an effort to listen, and it shows in their regulatory proposal,” she said.