Bob Corker

It seems to me that all of us have talked about the need for the credit markets to function.

I mean, that is nationalization.

This will be a public--I mean, the public sector would have to be involved, it seems, in helping create a good bank/bad bank.

We have decided that there are a number of institutions in our country that are too large to fail.

I think that is incredibly enlightening, probably the most enlightening thing that has been said in the last 5 weeks.

I think this is pretty educational.

The cure is stabilizing the financial system, and I know we have done a lot of different things over the last 5 or 6 weeks.

It seems to me that what we are throwing out is that notion that some folks have put forth--again, I am just observing--of creating some mechanism for these banks to actually be healthy now that is not going to happen.

I think the mechanism that is being put in place is a mechanism that absolutely means that none of the 20 major--19, 20 major banks in our country ever have the chance of being seized.

We are committed to ensuring the viability of all major U.S. financial institutions

It seems to me that what you have explained is a creeping nationalism of our banks.

It seems that when we do things like this, in many cases, it is the lowest-income people that end up getting hurt the worst by our good efforts.

I have to tell you, I feel like I am semi-sophisticated--semi--and I get incredibly confused by all these things I get in the mail.

A cap-and-trade system would be the underpinning of making intelligent market decisions.

It's an amazing thing to me that we would start out with such a crass policy that separates this country.

I would hope that, with all the troubles that our country has right now, that, instead of creating this divisive picking of winners and losers, we would, instead, focus on something that will unite our country.

I have no idea why we would take this transference-of-wealth component out that--we have many environmentalists in our State.

I think there is a tremendous desire that this country be energy-secure.

I have not heard of this comprehensive plan to deal with this problem and that creates uncertainty.

I think the White House and you all could communicate in that last night, the President said that you would be very clear and there would be specific plans.

Well, some of the TARP money, for instance, AIG is probably--that is an investment that is probably toast.

I think, actually, what the Secretary committed to earlier was not just Senator Shelby, a combination of where we are, but also an honest evaluation of where we are in the money, out of the money, as to guessing how much is actually gone…

I hope you will do it like an investor would, because we are investors, and let us go ahead and take our medicine and get our country moving again.

But isn't the major debate before us today whether we go ahead and address the losses now, get our banking system on a firm footing, and allow people to invest in common shares that they know are going to grow, allow these banks to begin…

I sense there is an internal debate that is taking place, and I think actually it is a debate that a lot of people are having.