Judd Gregg: “Well, I guess that makes the point. It is too bad. I would hope people would ask why. Why can't we have a vote? What is…”

“Well, I guess that makes the point. It is too bad. I would hope people would ask why. Why can't we have a vote? What is the fear out there? Are we so concerned about this segment of our industry that we are not willing to vote up or down on whether this type of a $20 billion event should occur? I hope not. It seems to me it is reasonable that the Congress should vote on that. The Senate should vote on that. Mr. President, $20 billion is a lot of money. Do you know $20 billion would run the State of New Hampshire for 5 years? This is a lot of money. This is big-time dollars. Twenty billion dollars is going to cost our children a lot because it compounds with interest. You just do not borrow it. You borrow it and have to pay interest on it. Of course, the interest gets paid to the Chinese or the Indians or the Saudis because they are the ones who probably buy the debt. So not only do we end up with a $20 billion bill we pass on to our kids, but we end up with our kids having to pay interest to the Saudis or the Chinese to support that debt. Also, that one segment of our society which participated in the robustness and the excitement of large economic expansion, and maybe inflated that expansion rather dramatically, does not have to bear the burden of their excesses. Well, as I said, Adam Smith would be a little stunned to find this is the way the market has worked and the Government of the United States-- which is allegedly the Government of a capitalist system--functions.”