Political Quotes

“Madam Speaker, it would be unconscionable for this Congress to fail to enact legislative protections for the Nation's consumers after the worst economic collapse in 80 years. We must pass Wall Street reform when it comes before the House hopefully later this week. We know what happened without adequate oversight. Under the Bush administration and previous Republican Congresses, the large financial institutions were granted free rein to undertake abusive, risky behavior, ultimately at great public expense. In the absence of well- enforced regulation, their reckless actions triggered the great recession, plunging millions of American families into economic chaos. Starting in 2007 when the mortgage and credit crises hit, the recession accelerated in 2008 as the financial sector came perilously close to a complete collapse. Millions of Americans acutely felt that collapse through lost jobs, foreclosed homes, and the destruction of their personal savings. Collectively, Americans lost $17.5 trillion worth of aggregate household wealth during that recession: college funds, retirement accounts, 401(k)s, and emergency nest eggs like that. In the midst of this economic carnage, many of the financial institutions that precipitated the collapse had the chutzpah to turn to those same American families and ask for a bailout.…”