Jeff Merkley

Housing is something that has been very much a part of my background as Director of Habitat for Humanity in Portland, Oregon, later a developer of affordable housing, later an advocate in the legislature for both strong rental assistance…

Your comments about legacy assets takes me back to earlier in the week in the Banking Committee, where legacy assets is now the term being used for the toxic collateralized debt obligations.

And to impact on ground level ozone.

The higher the volatility parameter, the greater potential for a particular renewable fuel to negatively impact environmental performance.

Then does that kind of accentuate the value of the potential philosophy, if you will, of forest thinning...

Let me dive in a little bit further.

If you could describe a little bit to what degree the process being used involves temperature and pressure?

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I echo everything that Senator Wyden said about the importance of taking advantage of biofuels in our overgrown second growth forests.

Biomass holds a lot of potential as a clean source of energy, but we want to make sure that it is harvested in a sustainable way.

So when you come from a community, a State like Jeff Merkley and I do where the Federal Government owns much of the land, this is a very real and palpable problem.

Thank you very much, Doctor. It is my turn to dash to the floor to vote.

I have often said that the success of our economy a generation from now depends on our investment in education today.

Does the preservation and expansion of the middle class in our country depend upon the expansion of manufacturing, or are there alternative strategies to have a large percentage of Americans in the middle class?

The President has identified that as sort of the alternative energies and the manufacturing that goes with wind turbines and solar panels as a win-win

The President has certainly said he wants to get this down, is committed to bringing it down

You know, so much of our effort now involves generating dollars through the Fed as well as appropriated response in terms of creating a stimulus, do we have a very good way of judging the tipping point at which the international community…

When those are taken together, consumer and government debt, is there any parallel to the Great Depression?

We have to protect the integrity of the staff judgments and try to insulate the Commission from political or economic pressures.

Does kind of this story give us any sense of insight into the role of the Commissioners, the pressure they are under to keep plants operating?

At the end of the day, the public's greatest safeguard in this area lies in the process of the appointment of Commissioners.

I really want to applaud the Fed for the actions they took over subprime lending, their action regarding escrow for taxes and insurance, their addressing of abusive prepayment penalties, the ending of liar loans in subprime.

I believe talked in your testimony about increasing financial obligations as the size of organizations creates greater risk.

The foundation of so many families financially is their homes, and that we need to provide superb protections designed to strengthen our families, not deregulation or loose regulations designed for short-term profits.

Certainly it is my view that the current crisis is an example of how failure to provide for adequate consumer protection compromises the safe and sound operation of financial institutions.