On the recordJanuary 28, 2010
In a little while we are going to be casting votes on an issue of enormous consequence, and that is whether we reappoint Ben Bernanke as Chairman of the Fed. I am here to argue that would be a very bad decision; that we should reject this nomination; that we need in this country a new Wall Street which understands its function is not simply to make as much money as it can for extraordinarily wealthy people on the Street, but to begin to interject the function of Wall Street into our productive economy, make credit available to small and medium-sized businesses so we can break out of this horrendous recession, which is causing so much pain from one end of this country to the other. In order to create a new Wall Street, we need a new Fed, and we need a new Fed Chairman who is going to provide new leadership. The same old, same old is not going to work. Everybody in America agrees and understands that a little over 1 year ago, our Nation--in fact the world's financial system--came to the edge of a major collapse. Everybody also understands that the function of the Fed is to protect the safety and soundness of our financial institutions. That is its main function. Can anybody deny with a straight face that the Fed and its Chairman, Mr. Bernanke, failed at its task? They failed.
