Political Quotes

“I have been in public office for 42 years, 43 years, and only once in those years in the New York State Assembly and in Congress did an agency come before me and say: ``We don't want any more money. We have enough.'' That was the SEC in the old days, under another administration. They didn't want any more money, and I was shocked. No agency ever does that. Then, when Wall Street fell apart, we found out why. They didn't want any more money because they didn't want to enforce anything. The gentleman is right in that Madoff got away with a lot of stuff; but now, when we have an SEC that looks at things differently--that says that we should ask questions, that we should, for instance, tell shareholders what they are doing to mitigate the problems that they may face as shareholders--we want to stop them. We can't have it both ways. I agree with the gentleman in that Madoff and people like him got away with things, but not because this SEC, in these modern times, was looking the other way. It was because it was during a period of time when they didn't care, when they didn't enforce anything. A lot of people didn't enforce anything. I will give you an example which is related. To my understanding, not a single person from Wall Street went to prison. I don't know if that is possible anywhere else. The Acting CHAIR. The time of the gentleman from New York has expired.”