Joe Pitts: “Yesterday the stock market took its sharpest dive since last fall. Some of the major indexes are lower than they have…”

“Yesterday the stock market took its sharpest dive since last fall. Some of the major indexes are lower than they have been since 1998. The reason, Mr. Speaker, is not that the economy is not strong. GDP grew at a rate of 6.1 percent last quarter. The reason is that a handful of dishonest executives got greedy during the heady days of the nineties. They began to lie and deceive in order to make it look like their companies were making more money than they actually were. By lying, they kept their stock prices up and made themselves rich. Even though only a few companies were involved, investor confidence has suffered severely. The President has a tough and sensible plan to punish the wrongdoers and make sure this does not happen again. The House has already acted on parts of the President's plan. There is only one thing standing in the way of fixing the problem: Politics, Mr. Speaker. Our friends on the other side of the aisle, especially in the other body, are intent on trying to blame this President and Republicans for what happened on their President's watch. This is not about blame, Mr. Speaker. It is about fixing a problem. Just once we ought to put politics aside and get the job done.”