Ted Poe: “I think the ranking member said it best yesterday when there were hearings on this that there was a time in this country…”

“I think the ranking member said it best yesterday when there were hearings on this that there was a time in this country when the people would go to the bank and borrow money from the bank. My grandfather was a banker for a good number of years, even back in the thirties, and when a person went to the bank, the bank would require sometimes that the bank would want to know what the money was going to be spent on, of all things, and then forms would be filled out and money would be loaned. Times have changed. Now the people loan money to the bank, to many banks, to the very special interest banks, and we know not what they are doing with that money, and certainly no background checks or forms were filled out by those banks before we gave them the money. Now we are being asked to do it again. We certainly don't learn our lessons. The cost of bailouts by this Congress last year exceeds the amount of the total cost of all the wars this country has been in; the American Revolution, the War of 1812, the Civil War, World War I, World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Iraqi War, the Afghanistan War. These bailouts that this Congress is spending the taxpayer money on costs more than all of the wars put together. Maybe we ought to decide to do something else than continue to spend money that doesn't belong to us, but belongs to the American public.”