Political Quotes

“Mr. President, on the 8th day of November of this year, I, along with Senator Hagan from North Carolina and Senator Landrieu from Louisiana, sent a letter to Secretary Donovan, Chairman Bernanke, Acting Director DeMarco, Chairman Sheila Blair, Chairman Schapiro, and Acting Comptroller Walsh, asking them to look closely at the 941(b) requirements of the Dodd-Frank bill relating to risk retention and to urge them to complete their work on carrying out the intent of that legislation through the amendment that the three of us cosponsored to create the exemption for risk retention requirements by the definition of a qualified mortgage. I rise today, on one of the final days in this Congress, to raise the importance of this issue because of the current fragile condition of the U.S. housing economy and, most importantly, to underscore what a handful of Senators in this body did last summer in the financial reform bill to begin to improve and strengthen the eroding lending standards that got us into this position in the first place. I ran a business for 22 years in residential housing in Atlanta. During that time, the average default rate, or delinquent rate, was about 3 percent on mortgages. The foreclosure rate was less than 1\1/ 2\. Things have changed dramatically in the last few years because of sloppy underwriting, no credit, and no documentation. We have seen some unbelievable new numbers.…”