Claire McCaskill

CLAIRE McCASKILL, Missouri

I want to look at these two transactions, and I want to talk a little bit about Timberwolf.

I wish we had done more to get there.

I want to make a bet. I want to go short on all these really bad mortgage loans that are out there that are all going to start going belly up.

You have relied on that complicated situation to avoid a lot of scrutiny.

It is hard for us to believe that if you all were doing the due diligence that you have stated a couple of times in your testimony, now we know that these things were full of this kind of stuff.

this notion that you guys are market makers and you also are sometimes taking positions outside of your just market making, that is what is hard for many of us to kind of get our arms around.

None of that seems like even-steven. None of that seems like you are an honest bookie who is trying to manage risk on both sides.

I want to know, generally speaking, the vig on a bookie bet. You are the house. You are the bookie.

It feels like you guys are betting on the game you are playing in and that maybe it is not a level playing field.

It appears that we are dragging you along kicking and screaming.

The point I am trying to make is it shows that an analysis was going on on the mortgages that went into your instruments internally.

In many ways, the focus on just your firm is tremendously unfair.

This notion of selling a product that you are betting against is hard for people to understand.

I think it is plain on its face that this is a Goldman Sachs employee that has analyzed a group of mortgages that you all were considering packaging up.

We have conflict of interest issues, we have disclosure issues, and we have transparency issues, and we need to get all of those fixed to make sure we don't have a repeat of this debacle.

I guess I would like to request, on behalf of the Subcommittee, that we see the analysis.

You put one side of the bet in the room with the people who are picking the product, which is, I think, bizarre.

I expect the number to grow.

It is time to end this stranglehold on the question of public business being done in public.

Senators have voted shamefully--shamefully.

I am clearly standing on their shoulders. They have been tilling in this field for years and years.

If we can do away with the secret hold, then I think we maybe will be striking the note that America is looking for-- that we can, on a bipartisan basis, say there are certain traditions here that maybe are not such a good idea anymore…

The premise is that when people are in debt and worried, they are more easily persuaded that someone can help them, because they're desperate for help.

I will not sit on this committee--and I know the Chairman--the Chairman will not--and I know, having gone through the confirmation for the new Commissioner at the FTC--I can't decide which is worse, the FreeCreditReport.com or you guys…