Paulson has got to give Congress and taxpayers real confidence in what he’s doing. The Congress is probably going to give him a lot of power, and he needs to make sure taxpayers are protected in this. This is an administration—Paulson on up and on down—that hasn’t looked out well for taxpayers or for consumers, and I want this legislation to go through in a form that works for taxpayers, that works for consumers, and also stabilizes the financial system.

Of course I’m concerned about the moral hazard. I’m also mostly concerned that this government, during the Bush years, with all these new financial instruments, the government is deregulated. That’s a big reason for the situation we’re in. That has more to do with it than what Senator Bunning said, I think. There are just too many cases where the government—where the regulators—were asleep. The president defunded much of the regulatory apparatus, and changed the rules, and did everything he could to protect some of the cowboys in the system, and unfortunately, a lot of residents of Cleveland and Zanesville are paying for it.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 16th, 2008 at 10:27 am and is filed under Politics .