Political Quotes

“I join my colleagues in urging the Senate to come together--Republicans and Democrats--around a strong bipartisan approach to financial regulatory reform. We need to address the critical causes behind the financial crisis of the last several years, and we need to do it right and in a bipartisan way. Unfortunately, we are not on that path yet. The Dodd bill, which the President and Chairman Dodd and others are trying to push to the floor, is a purely partisan approach and, unfortunately, it gets a lot of the bigger issues wrong. First, and perhaps most importantly, the Dodd bill expands too big to fail. It does not end it. The Dodd bill ensures more future bailouts. It does not get rid of the need for bailouts. It is not just me saying that. As conservative an authority as Time magazine wrote a few weeks ago: Policy experts and economists from both ends of the political spectrum say the bill does little to end the problem of banks' becoming so big that the government is forced to bail them out when they stumble. Some say the proposed financial reform may even make the problem worse. Another significant authority is Jeffrey Lacker. He is president of the Richmond Federal Reserve. He was interviewed by CNBC. The CNBC reporter said: Well, doesn't this bill allow all sorts of resolution? Isn't that ending too big to fail? He said, very clearly: It allows those things, but it does not require them.”