Floor Statements

Mr. Speaker, I want to pay tribute to the dedicated service of Ron Gettelfinger, the outgoing president of the United Auto Workers.

As UAW president for the last 8 years, Ron worked tirelessly to renew America's manufacturing sector, and move American manufacturing forward with focuses on advanced technology and renewable energy development.

During a time when American manufacturing was on the decline, and the American economy began sinking into the deepest recession in generations, Ron fought hard to keep jobs here at home, and was a leading voice for workers' rights.

Whether pushing for a fair wage or standing up for expanded access to health care, Ron Gettelfinger has been an unwavering advocate for all of America's working families. He understood that the middle class and manufacturing are the backbone of our Nation's economy and the root of America's prosperity.

His leadership will be missed.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the cosponsor of this resolution, Ms. Kosmas, for yielding.

Last week, we passed the Small Business Lending Fund Act. I offered an amendment at that time that would create the Office of Small Business Lending Fund Oversight under the authority of the Treasury Inspector General. This office would strengthen accountability by helping ensure that loans are being put to use where they're most needed and put to use in a way responsible to taxpayers. The bill we're now considering would further improve oversight by requiring the Treasury Secretary to certify to the Treasury Inspector General, under oath, that loan disbursements are based on economic need and not political considerations.

Credit where credit is due, Mr. Speaker. This idea was brought to the floor last week in a Republican motion to recommit. However, that measure would have required a special certification to the Special Inspector General for TARP, which is not the appropriate

oversight body for this bill. The Small Business Lending Fund is not part of TARP, and it isn't reliant upon TARP funds. But it is critically important that these loans are helping small businesses to invest and create jobs.

This legislation will provide greater assurance that the Small Business Lending Fund is most effective in aiding our recovery, and I urge speedy passage. However, I think I would be remiss if I weren't to comment on the gentleman from Texas's comments, and that is this comparison between the oath being taken by the Treasury Secretary and a 16-year-old driver. I do in fact believe an oath taken by the Secretary of the Treasury, just like an oath taken before a committee of Congress, means something, and it means something very serious.

Now, as much as the gentleman from Texas and his colleagues would have us want to talk about the TARP, this is not the TARP. This was never the TARP. And I want to remind the Members about the Inspector General at Treasury because we treat the Inspector General at Treasury as if he hasn't done this before. Several references were made last week to his inability.

So I want to talk just a minute about this. The Small Business Lending Fund will not be a TARP program. It will not be funded with TARP money, and the oversight body should not be TARP either. In fact, we're giving it to the Inspector General at Treasury, Mr. Thorson, who served as the Inspector General for the Small Business Administration from 2006 to 2008. In that short time, Mr. Speaker, his office uncovered what is believed to be the largest government-backed loan fraud scheme in history. He's not an amateur. Roughly $75 million was uncovered in that loan investigation. As a result of their investigation, they arrested 15 people in one day and convicted the executive vice president of one bank and the vice president of another.

Again, this is not TARP money. I realize that doesn't fit with the overall political objective of the opposition to suggest that we are extending yet another TARP. This is not TARP. This is about getting money to small businesses and creating jobs in the United States.

I thank the gentlelady for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, again, this is a straightforward amendment. If you want to make sure that politics isn't involved in the Small Business Lending Fund, you want to make sure that the Treasury is sticking to their oath and making sure that these are based on economic decisions, then you vote for this bill. If you believe politics should be part of it, then vote against it.

We keep missing the mark here in terms of the Republicans. The Republicans want to talk about SIGTARP. This isn't about TARP. No more should SIGTARP be overseeing the Department of Defense than should they be overseeing small business lending. This is about Treasury and making sure that politics aren't part of the decisions being made at Treasury. Again, if the Republicans think politics should be part of the decision, they can vote ``no,'' but we took them at their word that they didn't think politics should be part of the Treasury function. We've taken it away through the Inspector General. The Inspector General has an incredible track record. We respect that track record. And if the Republicans don't respect it, they can, with all due respect, vote against this. But again, this is not TARP money. As much as they would like to have us believe that this is, again, another TARP, it is not. And I realize that doesn't fit into the political rhetoric that is so often used around here, but it is the reality.

Madam Chair, I have an amendment at the desk.

Madam Chair, I yield myself such time as I may consume.

Madam Chair, we know that small businesses account for the majority of new jobs created in this country, and we know that making it easier for small businesses to borrow is essential to our continued economic recovery. This legislation will help small businesses access the credit they need to create the jobs that will move our economy forward, but we need to provide strong oversight to ensure that these loans are being put to use where they are most effective and put to use in a way that is responsible to the American taxpayer.

The amendment I have offered with my colleagues from Virginia and Kansas will establish the Office of Small Business Lending Fund Oversight under the authority of the Treasury Inspector General. The Special Deputy Inspector General of the oversight office will be required to monitor the Small Business Loan Fund and to report to Congress at least twice a year with recommendations for improving the program.

This amendment is about good government. It places no additional burdens on banks or small businesses. Instead, it makes a good bill better by ensuring accountability and transparency to the American people.

We've seen what happens when government fails to provide adequate protections when special interests are put ahead of the public good. Now we're taking steps to make up for the years of lax oversight and neglected responsibility.

Make no mistake, this bill is about creating jobs. Small business owners tell me constantly that they could begin hiring again if only they had access to credit and capital. This legislation will encourage banks to lend to small businesses, and my amendment will help protect taxpayers in the process.

This bill will strengthen our economic recovery without adding a dime to the deficit. I encourage my colleagues to support this amendment as well as the underlying legislation.

Madam Chair, I reserve the balance of my time.

Madam Chair, I would just comment on the gentleman's comments.

Yes, those amendments were offered, but as you know, not a dime of TARP money is being used in this bill, so it's not appropriate for SIGTARP to have the oversight. In fact, Mr. Thorson, who will have the oversight, has incredible experience overseeing small business programs. Before becoming the Inspector General of the Treasury Department, Mr. Thorson served as the Inspector General for the Small Business Administration from 2006 to 2008. In that short time, his office uncovered what is believed to be the largest government-backed loan fraud scheme in history, roughly $75 million. As a result of that investigation, they arrested 15 people in one day. That's oversight.

And so while the gentleman is asking for SIGTARP to have oversight, despite the fact that not a dime of TARP is being spent on this bill, we have oversight that is adequate, that is strong, that is contained in Treasury, that should have the oversight within this bill.

Madam Chair, I yield 30 seconds to my colleague from Illinois (Ms. Bean).

Well, I appreciate your yielding because I would like to rebut your first point about the TARP.

There is not a dime of TARP money going into this bill. You are undermining the authority--or attempting to undermine the authority of the Inspector General of Treasury.

As the gentleman knows, we disposed of that issue yesterday and we paid for it.

With all due respect to the gentleman, I know that this doesn't fit into the political framework of the Republicans to suggest that this is not TARP, this is not another bailout, this is about helping small businesses.

Madam Chair, the political framework of the Republicans is that they want to call everything a bailout. And when it's not a bailout, they want to act like it is. They want to call this TARP even when it's not. So this doesn't fit into the definition that they want to use out there on Fox News and elsewhere, but the fact of the matter is it's coming out of Treasury. Treasury deserves the oversight.

Madam Chair, I yield 1\1/2\ minutes to the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Connolly).

Madam Chair, I just want to remind the Members this amendment is about oversight; it's about doing our job to make government work properly. And while I realize it doesn't always fit into the political rhetoric of the other side, it is about good government. This isn't TARP; this isn't a bailout. This is about helping small businesses, moving the economy forward, and good government.

I appreciate the gentleman from New York for yielding.

This is a critical issue, and I share his concern with regard to stripping of the authorization for the competitive engine. Just this past year, the Weapon Systems Acquisition Reform Act of 2009 was passed by this Congress. It passed by a vote of 411-0. And I would draw Members' attention to section 202, the acquisition strategies to ensure competition throughout the lifecycle of major defense acquisition programs. That includes the Joint Strike Fighter and its propulsion system subject to its provisions.

As a matter of fact, Mr. Speaker, the alternative engine has been funded every year since 1996. The House has voted nine times to support the competitive engine. Already $2.9 billion has been invested in the alternative engine. And now that development is 75 percent complete, now that it has been qualified for production in 2012, now as both engines are approaching the starting line and are in the starting blocks, Pratt and the folks in Connecticut want to suggest that they should be declared the winners of the race before the race has even started.

We believe in competition when it comes to acquisition, Mr. Speaker. This is a critically important program. It's critically important to keep competition in the engine program.

And I will close with a quote from our former Member Jack Murtha, who fought for this competitive engine for years and years and years. ``We're going to build thousands of Joint Strike Fighters. And when you look back at problems we've had in the past with large aircraft procurement programs, you realize why it's absolutely essential to build two different engines. An alternative engine will provide cost savings through competition as well as provide greater reliability down the road in case we have problems with one engine that could potentially ground our entire tactical aircraft fleet.'' That is from former Congressman Jack Murtha, July 16, 2009.

I would ask my colleagues to support the competitive engine program and defeat the amendment.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for yielding.

Mr. Chairman, we will soon be considering an amendment, the Pingree amendment, which would strip away competition in the F-35, the Joint Strike Fighter, with the competitive engine program.

This Congress, on nine different occasions, has stood up for competition, and as recently as this Congress with the Weapon Systems Acquisition Reform Act of 2009, where the House passed the conference report 411-0. In section 202, we talk about the acquisition strategies to ensure competition throughout the life cycle of major defense acquisition programs.

It is estimated, Mr. Chairman, that 5,000 engines will be ordered for the Joint Strike Fighter--5,000 engines. The proponents of this amendment would have us do away with the competition despite the fact that this Congress has invested almost $3 billion in this competition today. Now that we are up and ready, now that the competitive engine is ready to move forward, they want to say, Stop. Stop the race before it even starts.

We know better than that, Mr. Chairman. We know better because we learned on the F-15 and on the F-16. We know that this will reduce costs in the long term. As my grandmother would say, this is a penny wise and a pound foolish.

Also, just this year, in March of 2010, the GAO report suggests that this goes beyond financial speculation. We know that this is going to save money. Beyond the finances, there are nonfinancial benefits-- better performance, increased reliability, and improved contractor responsiveness.

This is critically important. If for the next couple of decades we are going to rely upon this knowledge for our men and women in uniform, we need to make sure that it is reliable. We need to make sure that there is competition.

I urge my colleagues to reject the Pingree amendment.

Mr. Speaker, if we're serious about reducing spending, we should be promoting competition among government contractors, not stifling it. We know from experience that a competitive engine program for our military aircraft drives down long-term costs and leads to a more reliable product for our Armed Forces. That's why competitive procurement has long been the policy of the Federal Government, and that's why we need a competitive engine program for the Joint Strike Fighter.

But the primary contractor responsible for the upcoming F-35 Joint Strike Fighter engine doesn't want to play by the rules. They want to be declared the winner of the race while all of the contestants are still at the starting line. The development of a competitive engine is 75 percent complete and is expected to be available to the military 5 years ahead of initial projections. The competitive contractor has twice offered a fixed price to complete this project, ensuring production won't be burdened with cost overruns.

I urge all of my colleagues to do what's responsible to taxpayers and responsible to our men and women in uniform: Support the Joint Strike Fighter Competitive Engine Program.

Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from New York for his leadership on this issue.

When we talk about the economy, obviously clean energy is a critical piece of this. Wall Street reform is critical to making sure we don't repeat the mistakes that were made.

But oftentimes as I am sitting in that chair and you are sitting in that chair, you hear Republican after Republican after Republican come down to the floor and tell the American people that the sky is falling; that this is the worst economy, and we are still in that recession; that people can't find jobs; that the Recovery Act isn't working.

So I thought perhaps I would share with our audience not what you and I think and not what the Republicans have to say when they come down to the floor, but what other people are saying about the economy today, because there has been a lot of dispute as to the impact of the stimulus, of the American Recovery Act, as we passed it, what was it now, just over a year ago.

So let me tell you what has happened in that year. Just one year later the numbers speak for themselves. U.S. consumer confidence rose in April, reaching its highest level since September 2008. GDP grew for the third straight quarter, 3.2 percent. Consumer spending is up for the sixth straight month, surpassing pre-recession levels. Manufacturing activity increased for the ninth straight month at the fastest rate in nearly 6 years. Pending home sales are up for the fifth straight month, a 5.3 percent jump in just the last month, largely attributed to the tax credit for first-time home buyers that was included in the stimulus. Factory orders increased by the largest amount in more than 9 years, and car sales were up by 20 percent, according to The Wall Street Journal.

According to Market Watch, this is what they had to say. Hiring has increased in all 4 months so far in 2010, reversing nearly 2 straight years of job losses after the recession that began in December 2007, according to The New York Times.

This is unambiguously a strong report for growth implications, James O'Sullivan, chief economist at MF Global said. It adds to the evidence that the pickup in growth is leading to a clear-cut pickup in employment. It is very clear there has been a bounce here and momentum has been up, according to CNNmoney.com, another sign the recovery in the U.S. economy is taking hold.

According to the AP, clearly companies have found a newfound confidence in the future of the economic recovery on the part of their business prospects, said Joel Naroff, president of Naroff Economic Advisors. The broad-based job gains are an indication that businesses are feeling more comfortable about expanding their workforces.

According to Bloomberg, companies such as General Electric are boosting staff as sales improve, leading to income gains that may spur consumer spending and more hiring.

There is no doubt that the economy is recovering. There is no doubt that the stimulus that we voted on, that we infused into the economy, not only shortened the length of the recession, but shortened the severity of the recession.

But I think it is worthwhile to explore, because you brought up regulatory reform. We know the Senate recently passed their version of the bill, a bill that we passed last December. But I think it is important to take people back, take people back to where we were during the Bush administration and what was happening.

The former Congresswoman from northern Ohio, Stephanie Tubbs Jones, who passed away, Representative Tubbs Jones repeatedly came to this floor and sought predatory lending legislation to be heard on this House floor. It was denied her in 2000, in 2001, in 2002, in 2003, in 2004, in 2005, and in 2006.

In the meantime, Ohio was experiencing the worst foreclosure crisis that we have seen in generations, due in large part to the predatory lending activity that we were seeing on the part of brokers, on the part of out-of-town financial institutions.

What was enabling this? Well, we have come to find out what was enabling this. It was the mortgage-backed securities on Wall Street. It was the credit default swaps that backed up the mortgage-backed securities. It was the collateralized debt obligations. It was all of these fancy derivative products, none of which were being regulated.

They were being rated by the rating agencies hired by the same financial institutions that put the products together. So investors were purchasing these products, yet they didn't know what the underlying risk was.

So what happened? Well, I will tell you what happened. Because there was lax regulation, because the Bush administration and the SEC didn't look at these various securities and the various derivatives, they were shifting the risk away from the local markets. So in the past, when you would have to go to your local financial institution, you would have to go to the savings and loan and you would have to show proof of employment, you would have to show proof of income, and then the bank would offer you a loan, and you would share the risk. The bank would then take that mortgage paper and hold on to it. It would be part of their long-term investment portfolio.

That didn't happen anymore. What we saw was that as soon as that mortgage was closed, it would be immediately sold on to a secondary market. That would then be bundled into these mortgage-backed securities. So no longer was there any risk at the close of the deal.

So what did that incentivize? You had people closing as many deals as they possibly could to whoever walked in the door at the highest rates they could possibly get, putting people that shouldn't have qualified for loans into bad loans destined to fail. That is what was contained in most mortgage-backed securities. That is what those credit default swaps were backing up, and that is why it was a house of cards ready to collapse.

Where were the regulators? Where was the Republican leadership, when so many times Democrats came to the floor and said we needed to crack down on this behavior? Well, the mortgage bankers were supporting the Republican leadership. They didn't want to see change. They were making handsome profits on Wall Street.

But finally we have an opportunity. Finally we have an opportunity after this crisis, knowing that it led to the greatest recession in our lifetime. Finally we have an opportunity to do something about it, and that is Wall Street reform. That is what we passed in the House. That is what we passed in the Senate. That is what the Republicans are now standing in the way of.

And the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the largest single tax cut for middle income families in the United States.

And it's pretty clear to me that the Republican Caucus wants to take us back to the failed policies of the Bush administration, the exact same failed policies that brought us to the worst recession we've seen since the Great Depression. And they do it using scare tactics. They go out to the American people and suggest that we're raising their taxes.

Well, I was struck, as many people were struck, by the headline in USA Today on May 11. May 11: ``Tax bills in 2009 at lowest level since 1950.'' Since 1950.

Now, you might ask, where does this come from? Well, it comes from the Bureau of Economic Analysis, where they say, Federal, State and local taxes, including income, property, sales and other taxes, consumed 9.2

percent of all personal income in 2009, the lowest rate since 1950. The lowest overall tax rate since 1950.

On average, though, the tax rate paid by all Americans, rich and poor combined, has fallen 26 percent since the recession began in 2007. That means a $3,400 annual tax savings for a household paying the average national rate and earning the average national household income of $102,000.

Every once in a while, the facts get in the way of the arguments being made by the Republicans because, time and time again, they will come down to the floor and talk about how the taxes are going up for middle-income Americans. But the proof is far different.

You know, I know that, through the stimulus package, we lowered taxes. And according to reports all across America, the economists agree with us that these are the lowest tax rates since 1950.

So I think, when you talk about the stimulus, and the Republicans often say, we need to be putting money back in the hands of the American taxpayer, that's exactly what we did. That is exactly what we did in the stimulus, and it's reflected in the tax rates

I think it's important to note, though, that we didn't just stabilize the economy, we didn't just keep it from continuing to go into the ditch, we didn't just stop the recession. We also laid the foundation for future growth. I think our colleague from California was mentioning this earlier, and I think this is really important for all of us to understand.

When we talk about the future economy, it's an economy of knowledge and it's an economy where there is investment in new energy technologies, where there is investment in energy efficiency, where there is investment in health care IT. There are such huge opportunities for all of us in these areas.

I know in Ohio, the Governor was just down in Cincinnati the other day talking about all of the energy companies wanting to come to Ohio and take advantage of the investments being made in new energy technology, much of that coming from the stimulus as well as funding coming from the State of Ohio.

I know when I went out in Cincinnati to a foundry where they used to work with steel and they built steel rolls, they have now changed their technology, realizing that that same steel, that same fabrication, those same talents and skills can be used to make the gears for windmills. They see into the future. They get it. And we are laying the foundation for the future growth of this economy.

I think we have tremendous opportunity. And I think we are close to wrapping this up. But I would agree wholeheartedly that this is about innovation. It's about giving American businesses the tools to move forward. They were in desperate straits in January of 2009, when you took that oath of office, when I took that oath of office, when President Obama took the oath of office. We were in the middle of the worst recession in our lifetimes, caused by greed and corruption on Wall Street. We have an opportunity to address that greed and corruption.

The Republicans have the opportunity to turn things around, to join us in holding Wall Street accountable. But more importantly, they have an opportunity to embrace the policies that are making a difference. We know the economy is turning around. We have spent the last hour citing the various sources who support that notion. We know the GDP is growing.

We know people are going back to work, and we're investing in their intellect. We're investing in their skills. We're investing in new technology. That's what's so critically important. If we are to see continued growth over time, we have to be making those necessary investments, and we are making those investments.

But at the same time, we have to have the courage to stand up--stand up to the oil companies who would have us dependent upon foreign oil for years to come. We have to have the courage to stand up to the Wall Street investment bankers who want to control all of the decisions when it comes to the economy but don't have the best interests of small businesses in mind. We have to have the courage to stand up to do the right thing and make the right investments in our economy. That's what we're doing. That's what this agenda has done as we move forward.

And I'll pass it back to the gentleman from New York.

Mr. Speaker, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today to pay tribute to one of Cincinnati's great citizens, Donald Spencer.

Donald Spencer's philosophy in life was, ``When you leave this world, it should be better because you have lived.'' He certainly made this world a better place. Donald Spencer lived life to the fullest and touched many as a community leader, a teacher, and a real estate broker. He was born March 5, 1915, and he died yesterday, May 4, 2010.

Donald Spencer was the first African American real estate broker with the Cincinnati Area Board of Realtors, but teaching never left his blood. A life-long resident of Cincinnati, he helped pave the way for African Americans in education, as well as real estate, during his career.

Having graduated from Walnut Hills High School before earning his bachelor's degree and master's degree from the University of Cincinnati by 1940, Mr. Spencer embarked on an 18-year teaching career at Douglass, Stowe and Bloom junior high schools.

He opened his real estate office concurrently with the last 6 years of teaching. Five years later, he was well-established as Donald A. Spencer and Associates. The firm eventually grew to 23 on its staff and prospered for 30 years, first with an office in Walnut Hills and later in Avondale.

He was named president of the Cincinnati Association of Real Estate Brokers and was active with PAC, the national policy-making commission of the National Association of Real Estate Brokers.

A staunch supporter of Cincinnati public schools, Mr. Spencer chaired the 2001 campaign, successfully passing the November tax levy. In 2003, he served with CASE, Cincinnatians Active in Support of Education, which led to the passing of the $435 million levy to build 35 new schools and renovate the remaining 31 buildings.

A lifetime member of the NAACP, Mr. Spencer was active his entire adult life in civic, religious, and civic rights organizations. A member of Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity, he established the undergraduate chapter on the University of Cincinnati campus in 1939. He served on the Boards of Ohio University for 2 years as its president, the Ohio Valley Goodwill, the Fenwick Club, and Family Housing Developers. He was a founding board member of the Friends of Cincinnati Parks and an executive board member of the Walnut Hills High School Foundation.

He also has been active in the Boys Club, the Cincinnatus Association, the City of Cincinnati Board of Housing Appeals, the Task Force on Racial Isolation in Cincinnati Public Schools, and Cincinnati's Historic Conservation Board. He was a 30-year trustee at Mt. Zion United Methodist Church, now the New Vision United Methodist Church. Among his many honors, Donald Spencer in 1997 received the Charles P. Taft Civic Gumption Award from the Cincinnati Charter Committee.

In 2001, the Cincinnati Park Board developed the Donald A. Spencer Overlook in Eden Park, one of our jewels, to recognize his many years of service to the park system.

Mr. Spencer received the Founders' Citation from the Ohio University Board of Trustees, one of only 14 people to receive the honor in the university's 200-year history.

He leaves behind his wife, Marian, his wife of nearly 70 years, and the legacy that lived up to his own philosophy.

When you look at the folks in Cincinnati and you look at the people that make a difference, the Spencers are the First Couple of Cincinnati.

Mr. Spencer will be dearly missed. He was a treasure to all of us in Cincinnati.

Thank you, Congressman Garamendi. I appreciate very much your taking the leadership tonight on this issue, which is so critically important.

There is a tremendous amount of misinformation out there about what has gone on in terms of the financial markets. I happen to sit on the Financial Services Committee, so I've seen firsthand what we have been able to do in terms of structuring a fix for what is going on on Wall Street and for what happened on Wall Street.

Yet it would be a mistake just to talk about the fix without talking about the history. Far too often, the Republicans would have us believe that all of this history began in January of 2009, which is when Barack Obama took the oath of office and when we took the oath of office. The facts are far different, and I think it is important to help voters and folks out there to better understand exactly how we got to where we are.

I remember as a State legislator, when I served in the Ohio House from 2001-2008, that these issues of predatory lending and of foreclosure came up over and over again. I pushed Governor Strickland to create a foreclosure task force in the State of Ohio, and I was proud to serve on that task force. Yet what we realized way before the task force was formed was that so many of these problems were Federal in nature. They were Federal in scope; though, the Federal Government was doing very little to regulate Wall Street, to regulate the mortgage industry.

My colleague Mr. Ellison mentioned predatory lending and the failure to enact predatory lending legislation. I will remind the viewers and I will remind this body, Mr. Speaker, that it was in 2000 that Congresswoman Stephanie Tubbs Jones from Ohio--God rest her soul-- introduced predatory lending legislation here in the House. They could have enacted that in 2000. They could have enacted it in 2001, in 2002, in 2003, in 2004, in 2005, and in 2006. Every year, she brought forward legislation concerning predatory lending because she understood the impact this was having in neighborhoods across Ohio and across the country, but they failed to act. We knew that these things were being created on Wall Street, things like mortgage-backed securities and credit default swaps, which backed up the mortgage-backed securities, and collateralized debt obligations, which backed those up. The vast majority of the people had no idea that these things even existed much less what they were doing.

What we soon found out was that these mechanisms on Wall Street were allowing for the bubble to occur, which then led to the collapse when we found out what was actually contained in them.

For just a minute, Congressman, I'll talk about how the risk was shifted, because this is fundamental to what happened. You know, years ago, you would go to a savings and loan or you would go to a bank, and you would try to get a mortgage on your house. The risk would be shared between the financial institution and the homeowner, and they would hold onto the paper. The financial institution would hold onto that mortgage paper, and it would be part of their investment portfolio; but that is not what happened in the 2000s.

What happened in the early 2000s was that investment vehicles were created on Wall Street that no longer required that bank or that savings and loan to hold onto that paper. They sold it immediately. They sold it immediately onto a secondary market that was created. These things were then brought together in thousands of mortgages, called ``mortgage-backed securities.'' They were then sold to international investors, to pension funds--to all kinds of entities.

In the meantime, the rating agencies were rating these things at AAA despite the fact that many of the mortgages contained in these packages were bad mortgages. Oftentimes, they were 2- or 3-year adjustable rate mortgages to subprime borrowers. ``Subprime borrowers'' are simply borrowers who have poor histories of paying back in the first place.

So what behavior did this incentivize? Well, at the front end, I will tell you what it incentivized.

You had mortgage brokers and financial entities going out there trying to qualify anybody they possibly could for a mortgage at the highest prices they could possibly get because they were no longer holding onto the paper. It was no longer a long-term investment of the property value of that home; it was at the close of the deal. If it's at the close of the deal, you're going to close as many deals as you possibly can. That's why they were qualifying people who should never have qualified for mortgages. That is how this bubble was created.

Now, I have heard a lot of my colleagues come down here and blame the Community Reinvestment Act over and over again. If you listen to conservative talk radio, they say the banks were forced to lend into these neighborhoods and the banks were forced to make bad loans. Now, I've never come across a bank that didn't have the power to say ``no'' to a loan, but they would have you believe that it was the banks that were forced to do this because of the Community Reinvestment Act. So I just want to bring a few things to the attention of the public.

First of all, the Community Reinvestment Act was established in 1977. So if the Community Reinvestment Act was the problem, you would think that maybe we would have seen this in the 1980s and the 1990s. But we didn't because the Community Reinvestment Act wasn't the problem.

What the Community Reinvestment Act did was it provided incentives for financial institutions to go into neighborhoods where there were depositors in those financial institutions but folks weren't qualifying for loans because they had red-listed entire areas. They weren't required to make bad loans. They were just required to go into the neighborhoods and make good loans.

And if I can just refer to Ben Bernanke in a letter November 25, 2008, who said this, and he's responding to one of our Senate colleagues:

``Thank you for your letter of October 24, 2008, requesting the Board's view on claims that the Community Reinvestment Act is to blame for the subprime meltdown and current mortgage foreclosure situation. We are aware of such claims but have not seen any empirical evidence presented to support them. Our own experience with CRA over more than 30 years and recent analysis of available data, including data on subprime loan performance, runs counter to the charge that CRA was at the root of, or otherwise contributed in any substantive way to, the current mortgage difficulties.''

The fact of the matter is over 80 percent of the bad loans that went into default, that caused the foreclosure crisis, over 80 percent, were from financial entities and nonfinancial entities that didn't even participate in the Community Reinvestment Act.

I think it's a good point, Congressman. There was no regulation. There was no regulation of mortgage-backed securities. There was no regulation of credit default swaps. So when folks get up and say we have enough regulation on Wall Street, well, there may be regulation, but the regulation was in the wrong place.

So if you look at the bill that came through the House when it comes to regulatory reform, we focused on some sound principles. First, the creation of a Consumer Financial Protection Agency, an independent agency that provides consumers with information, good information, about the products that they are being offered. Now, this isn't a crazy idea. You know, we often said in the State of Ohio that you were safer purchasing a toaster than you were a home loan because you had more consumer protections purchasing a toaster. And that's true. You have consumer protections when it comes to purchasing a vehicle. You have consumer protections if you purchase toys for your kids. But you don't have those same consumer protections when it comes to a home loan.

I appreciate that. And picking up on that point, the CFPA is critical to provide consumers information. But if you go back down to No. 5 on that list, strengthening community banks, this strengthens community banks because so much of the problem occurred outside of the financial institutions in the first place.

Many of these subprime mortgages, many of these bad loans didn't originate with community banks. The community banks were doing the right thing. But there was no regulation of the behavior of these nonfinancial entities. So for the first time, the CFPA will step in and provide regulation over the product itself. So it doesn't matter how you structure your entity to avoid regulation. The regulation will come in the form of the product. So if you're offering a consumer product which is determined to be a bad product for consumers, you will be prohibited from offering that, regardless of the type of entity that you are.

This is important because banks are very wary of regulators and for good reason, especially community banks, who have regulators coming in all the time to make sure that safety and soundness is being complied with and to make sure that consumers are being treated fairly. But what the CFPA gets at isn't additional burdens on community banks, but it's going after those previously nonregulated entities to make sure that they are following the law and that the products they are offering are fair and that the disclosures they are providing are clear, that they're transparent, and consumers know what they are getting themselves into.

Yes, I believe it will absolutely strengthen the community banks.

And as you know, many of the community banks were provided additional protections, Mr. Speaker, by making sure that the CFPA was only part of the regulatory structure when we went into community banks so that we didn't place yet an additional burden in terms of an examination on that community financial institution.

So I believe this is an additional protection because for far too long, these entities were existing outside of a regulated marketplace, which put community banks, the guys that were doing the right thing, the guys that so many of us rely upon, and lend to small businesses, lend to people trying to purchase their homes--they were at a competitive disadvantage, and this really does strengthen those community banks because it forces everybody to have an even playing field.

Getting back to the issue of too big to fail, because I think this is really a critical issue for people to get their arms around. I think it's important that we have strong capital markets; that the private sector works well in providing capital to allow our businesses to grow, to allow people to invest in the economy. That's critically important. But the issue of too big to fail really comes back to our responsibility, because when an entity is too big to fail, then it suggests that they go well beyond losses that might just impact the shareholders or losses that might just impact the owners or the employees of a business, but in fact it impacts all of us.

We then have a responsibility so that when the harm that's caused by these institutions is so great that it impacts the public good, then the United States Congress has a responsibility. In this case, the foreclosure crisis. Not only have we seen the greatest recession in our lifetimes but we have seen neighborhoods just devastated by foreclosures all across this country. Certainly, in the State of Ohio, where I come from.

The cost is enormous. That's not being repaid by Goldman Sachs. Lehman Brothers isn't around to do it. The big investment firms on Wall Street aren't there when we're having crime in our neighborhoods due to the foreclosures. It's the residents and the local governments that are left to pick up the pieces. That's what we mean by too big to fail.

So never again will we allow an entity to get so big that its failure will cause such a calamity not just to the economy but to our neighborhoods, to our communities, and obviously to jobs across the country. So we've put mechanisms in place to prohibit entities from growing that large. And if they are so large that their collapse would have this tremendous impact, we provide for a provision to allow the Fed to

wind them down and allow Treasury to wind them down--not at taxpayer expense but at their own expense and at the expense of financial entities who are contributing to a pool. We don't believe in the government bailouts. We are trying to put an end to government bailouts. What we are trying to do is allow these to be dissolved in a way that's fiscally responsible. That's what we mean by too big to fail.

I think it's critically important as you move through this list to help people better understand exactly what it is that we're doing. One of the big issues that comes up time and time again is the issue of transparency. Because transparency was a big problem. It wasn't that the regulations didn't necessarily exist on some of these products, but people didn't know what was in the products. And so the Wall Street banks were intentionally hiding the risk associated with some of these derivative products.

Derivatives by their very nature are derived from other capital. But they're critically important. They're critically important to our system, our economic system, because they provide capital investment that creates jobs in our economy. So we don't want to stop derivatives. We want to create investment vehicles. Derivatives are okay, but these investment vehicles need to be transparent. That's all we're asking through the legislation, is that the risk associated with the product be clear so that the people investing in these products know the risk associated with their investment. This is basic. This is basic finance, that people asking to invest in products should know the risk associated with those investments. That's what we're trying to achieve through the regulatory reform bill.

Well, I would just share with you and share with everyone here that the reality is that, from a legislative standpoint, nothing has changed. Despite the fact that we're in the worst recession that we've ever experienced--we all know what caused this. We know how we got here. We know the lack of regulation on these very sophisticated financial instruments caused the mortgage meltdown which led to the recession. But the fact of the matter is, legislatively, nothing has changed in statute.

We passed a good bill out of the House----

We passed a good bill that had a lot of measures. Subsequent to that, after it went over to the Senate, there has been stalling by the Republican Senators. We've had closed-door meetings by leadership of the Republicans in the House and in the Senate, both here in Washington and on Wall Street, because the financial firms on Wall Street like the status quo. We've seen their profits. They're back to the days of big bonuses. But our neighborhoods are still struggling. Our neighborhoods are still trying to get out of the foreclosure crisis that has impacted them, And it's going to be years before they come out of that crisis. It's the most important thing that we can do here is make sure that this never happens again, but our Republican colleagues in the Senate are standing in the way. At least here, the Republicans just voted ``no,'' but they couldn't stop the process from moving forward.

We, as a Congress, have an obligation to the people. We, as a Congress, have an obligation to the people to ensure that the crisis that we found ourselves in never happens again. We do that through strong regulatory reform. We've passed a strong measure in the House. We're waiting upon the Senate to tell the American people that we won't let this happen again. That is our responsibility, and that's what we need to impress upon people as we move forward.

Enough of the closed-door meetings with Wall Street; it's time to act on behalf our constituents.

Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor the University of Cincinnati Bearcats football team and congratulate them on their historic achievements in the 2009 season. In addition to winning a school-record 12 games, UC won its second straight Big East football title. The Bearcats finished the regular season fourth in the nation in both the USA Today and the Associated Press polls with an undefeated record. UC also played in the 2010 Sugar Bowl, its second consecutive Bowl Championship Series game. In addition, the football team and the university community ``adopted'' and embraced a 12-year-old cancer patient named Mitch Stone through Friends of Jaclyn, a foundation that links youngsters with brain tumors to college and high school sports teams. Today, Mitch is cancer-free.

I am proud to recognize Mitch Stone and the University of Cincinnati Bearcats football team, its coaches, and UC President Gregory H. Williams for their 2009 football season, and recognize the students, faculty, and leadership for their record-setting support for UC's most successful season in history.

Roster: 14 Chazz Anderson, 86 Blake Annen, 51 Alex Apyan, 43 Robby Armstrong, 85 Marcus Barnett, 9 Dominique Battle, 69 Frank Becker, 80 Armon Binns, 38 Brent Black, 48 Maalik Bomar, 76 Austen Bujnoch, 21 Camerron Cheatham, 57 Obadiah Cheatham, 70 C.J. Cobb, 12 Zach Collaros, 55 Austin Cook, 41 Michael Cooke, 79 Andre Cureton, 33 Chris Damiano, 42 Dorian Davis, 72 Evan Davis.

39 Alex Delisi, 96 Tom DeTemple, 10 Romel Dismuke, 65 T.J. Franklin, 26 Drew Frey, 99 Dan Giordano, 22 John Goebel, 66 Sam Griffin, 19 Ben Guidugli, 23 Reuben Haley, 59 Steve Hancock, 81 Tomaz Hilton, 92 Michael Hilty, 31 Quentin Hines, 59 Alex Hoffman, 77 Sean Hooey, 31 Bruce Homer, 6 Jamar Howard, 40 John Hughes, 5 Reuben Johnson.

46 Scott Johnson, 11 Brendon Kay, 60 Jason Kelce, 18 Travis Kelce, 64 Mitch Kessel, 13 Pat Lambert, 47 Colin Lozier, 53 Randy Martinez, 11 Collin McCafferty, 49 Sean McClellan, 46 Mitch Meador, 83 Danny Milligan, 58 Brandon Mills, 34 Patrick O'Donnell, 68 Craig Parmenter, 91 Ryan Paxson, 82 Lynell Payne, 23 Isaiah Pead, 67 Doug Pike, 36 Quincy Quetant.

41 Jared Rains, 24 Wesley Richardson, 22 Aaron Roberson, 88 Adrien Robinson, 97 Jake Rogers, 16 Will Saddler, 37 J.K. Schaffer, 61 Jonathan Simmons, 51 Brady Slusher, 63 Dan Sprague, 94 Jordan Stepp, 54 Walter Stewart, 52 Ricardo Thompson, 45 Rob Trigg, 14 Chris Williams, 2 Darrin Williams, 32 George Winn, 95 Derek Wolfe, 84 Orion Woodard, 3 D.J. Woods.

Mr. Speaker, last week the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Cincinnati lost a committed and humble servant when Father Edward Rudemiller passed away.

``Father Rudy,'' as he was known, was ordained in 1958 and served the people of southwestern Ohio for 47 years before retiring in 2005. A 1950 graduate of Elder High School in Cincinnati, he returned to his alma mater in 1959 to teach religion and Latin for 21 years.

In addition to these duties, he was the athletic director from 1962- 1977. He could often be seen on Friday nights at the ``Pit'' strolling the sidelines in support of his Panthers.

Although best known for his loyalty to Elder High School and the west side of Cincinnati, Father Rudemiller was equally beloved in his role as parish priest and pastor at parishes throughout the archdiocese.

In his later years, Father Rudy fought through illness with dignity and grace. We are grateful for his service and we celebrate his life.

Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of this health care legislation.

Mr. Speaker, last week Cincinnati lost a committed public servant and a valued friend when Pete Strauss passed away.

Pete served on the Cincinnati City Council from 1981 until 1993, serving part of that time as the city's vice mayor. More than just a politician, Pete was a leader, a person who truly embodied the virtues of leadership. He sought office not out of personal ambition, but from a desire to improve the lives of those in our community. He served Cincinnati, not with a political or partisan agenda, but to get results for the people and city he represented.

When I was a young man with a growing interest in government, I and many others like me looked up to Pete Strauss as the kind of public servant we have since aspired to become.

Pete's character was beyond question, and his bravery was exhibited in his courageous fight against Parkinson's. He will be dearly missed by his wife, Kitty, his sons, Mike and Matt, and all of the city that he loved and served for so long. Thank you, Pete.