Barney Frank

Let's define what this is. This is allowing adult Americans to spend their own money as they wish in a form of recreation that they enjoy.

I cannot understand how anyone would think that it is the role of the Federal Government to prohibit them from doing that.

I think you have done what we all can try to do and it is hard to do.

It should have been on Halloween, because we have conjured up a series of spooks, and ghosts, and goblins, and nonexistent creatures.

This is the second oversight hearing we have had this week to denounce the lack of oversight, because there was a field hearing.

I said before I thought it was interesting that we were having an oversight hearing to in part denounce the lack of oversight, and I misspoke.

I think you misrepresented it very substantially.

I think some of those things had as much relationship to the real economy as fantasy football does to what happens on Sunday afternoon.

The swipe fee thing was a present to America from the United States Senate.

There was no right to make a profit if there is mistreatment of the customers.

This is a matter of clear national interest that has had a strong bipartisan element.

That's one of the--what I plan to do--and I hope we can get this--is to amend that 10-year thing.

We plucked this arbitrary 10-year number out of the air and put it into the statute.

We're not talking about permanently fouling anything. We're not talking about people dying from bad air or being poisoned by bad water.

The reflex is, 'Let's say no.' The reflex is, 'Let's not have a catch.'

We had a bipartisan agreement--Senator Snowe and others in the Senate, Senator Brown, Senator Kerry.

I think the catch is the essential issue.

Your testimony cherry-picks what looks good and leaves out what's not good, and that's not building trust.

I wish it wasn't on this point--mainly that there is a pretty complete sense on the part of the fishermen in Massachusetts that they face a hostile administration.

Sarbanes-Oxley is a great confidence builder.

I am less enamored of further reducing the reach of Sarbanes-Oxley.

I agree that we should be moving in a direction of reducing unnecessary regulation, particularly on smaller entities.

That is kind of like saying, if you live in Iowa, you have more chance of being eaten by a shark than if you lived in Montana.

We clearly believe that municipalities have been badly treated by this system.

These are people who have systematically overrated private securities but systematically underrated public entities.