Chris Dodd

I support the actions the regulators have collectively taken to stabilize the financial system.

Without a new comprehensive resolution regime, we will be forced to repeat the costly ad hoc responses of the past year.

Ultimately, I believe if we are able to reach some sort of agreement on systemic risk and whether it can be managed, I strongly believe that we should consider every possible alternative to the Fed as a systemic risk regulator.

Handing over the public purse to an enhanced Fed is simply inconsistent with the principles of democratic Government.

Taxpayers had no choice but to step in, assuming billions of dollars of risk, and save companies because our system wasn't set up to withstand their failure.

The economic crisis introduced a new term to our national vocabulary--systemic risk.

We want to commend Chairman Dodd and other members of the Committee for your leadership in getting this important legislation enacted.

For over 2 years, this Committee has worked to stem the tide of foreclosures in America.

Thank you particularly, Mr. Chairman, for co-authoring with Chairman Frank a letter last week highlighting the need to help families keep their homes and avoid foreclosure.

I am frustrated--that is a mild word to use--that we even have to hold this hearing at all.

Weeks go by and there is no resolution. There is no conclusion as to whether or not that situation can be resolved.

I want to raise the issue with you about the principal reduction versus the payment reduction approach.

I'm frustrated that we have to hold this hearing.

It seems to me then it is better to get that property up, get it auctioned off, and get it moving.

Obviously, there is a lot of frustration in these numbers we hear this morning.

I am prepared to make some of these investments provided we get some results.

These families are the foundation of our economy and the reason we're here in Washington working on this historic and critically important legislation.

That's why the first piece of the Administration's comprehensive plan to rebuild our regulatory regime and our economy is something I have championed: an independent agency whose job it will be to ensure that American consumers are treated…

The important work we do on this Committee is often complex and painstaking in its detail.

We want to work with you. We have got a lot of work to do.

The greatest Attorney General in the United States of America.

The failure of that system in recent years has left our economy in peril, as we all know, and caused real pain for many hard-working Americans who did nothing wrong themselves.

The present system of consumer protection is not designed to be independent or accountable, effective, or balanced. It is designed to fail.

The problem is the structure itself.

These families are the foundation, as all of us know, of our economy and the reason that we are here in Washington working on this historic and critically important legislation.