Jeff Merkley

I believe that earlier in the year you called for a surcharge, which we might call an anti-bailout equity buffer, of as much as 7 percent.

Certainly that was the discussion that was taking place among those of us who were immersed in trying to get rid of the liar loans, was that you would have a safe harbor.

If there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask unanimous consent that it stand adjourned under the previous order. There being no objection, the Senate, at 9:52 p.m., adjourned until Monday, December 5, 2011, at 2 p.m…

The next rollcall vote will be Monday at 5:30 p.m. on confirmation of one of the judicial nominations. We expect the remaining three judges to be confirmed by consent. As a reminder, cloture was filed on the nomination of Caitlin Joan…

The Senator is correct. The amendment is designed to encourage, to increase the pace of the reduction of U.S. forces and the transfer of responsibility to Afghanistan's forces.

One of the advantages, of course, of preemption is you create this consistent playing field across the country.

Both Senator Bennet and I share a real interest in the crowdfunding issue, and I am going to direct my questions in that direction.

I call for the regular order. The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The amendment is now pending.

I think both of your associations have members who export products to Canada, which has yet a different structure, and to Europe.

Your leadership on this issue has been extremely important, and your commitment to modernizing the Toxic Substance Control Act so we can protect our families from exposure to dangerous toxins is terrific.

The shocking part for me is that the Environmental Protection Agency has been unable to protect our families from exposure because the Toxic Substance Control Act does not provide EPA with the necessary tools to collect data on chemical…

The reason--and I am over my time now, so I will just summarize this--the reason I am pushing this point is trying to understand where there are insights here about the complexities of regulating a firm that is both a broker-dealer and a…

That does not convey any sense of urgency. And indeed, it has been enormously frustrating to FHFA to have Fannie and Freddie very resistant to their Short Refinance Program.

It is just obscene that Americans should be subjected to that by the one major program designed to assist them escape from the predatory mortgages they already had or other impacts of the economy on working families.

But it seems much better to help people have strong financial lives so that they never have to resort to a safety net in the first place.

This bill will go a long way to helping to prevent that kind of problem.

I appreciate the testimony from both of you and the work you are doing to protect older Americans, senior Americans.

One bright spot for our State has been the Oregon Native American Business and Entrepreneurial Network.

For the tribes in the Northwest and certainly in Oregon, economic development has long been tied to timber, fishing industry, and other natural resource areas.

There will be a rollcall vote at approximately 12:15 p.m. tomorrow on confirmation of the Wallach nomination. Additionally, we expect to begin consideration of H.R. 674 during tomorrow's session. ____________________

If there is no further business to come before the Senate, I ask unanimous consent that it adjourn under the previous order. There being no objection, the Senate, at 6:36 p.m., adjourned until Tuesday, November 8, 2011, at 10 a.m…

If schools out there are still using paper tests and the results come back months later, that is crazy.

Is it time to try something far more aggressive...

I think the real question here, which goes to what Senator Corker raised, is the time line...

Did our support of basically the dislocation or removal of the government there undermine our foreign policy objectives in Iran?