Pelosi Open to More Federal Money for Banks
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told me during our exclusive interview on "This Week" that she is open to President Obama’s request for billions more from Congress to direct to the banks, but argued there has to be accountability for the first $350-billion in TARP money.
I’m open to resolving the financial crisis in our country," Pelosi said, but added, "Certainly there is a lot of unrest and unease in the Congress with how the first installment of the money was spent. No accountability. Now the administration will be calling for that. The new administration. Whatever we have to do will have to be clearly explained to Congress and to the American people as to what the purpose of the money is, why it is urgent, and then accountability for it as it is distributed. So hopefully this next second installment will help turn our financial crisis around but it’s not – if they come back there’s going to have to be a justification because people will be very, very disappointed in how his money was dealt with at first."
Pelosi said American taxpayers people should have a stake in the banks the government has given billions to.
I asked her if she would be open to a nationalization, or partial nationalization, of the nation’s banks.
"There has to be – if we are going to put money into the banks we certainly want equity for the American people. In other words, if we are strengthening them then the American people should get some of the upside of that strengthening. Some people call that nationalization. I’m not talking about total ownership but we’re just saying. Now how big that investment becomes is – would we have ever thought we would see the day when we’d be using that terminology? Nationalization of the banks," Pelosi said.
"You see the impact it has on the stock market. Just terrible in terms of the bank stocks going down. Because if you’re a shareholder and you see what would be a dilution of your investment because now the federal government – if we’re putting – if the taxpayer is putting money up, the taxpayer should have equity," she said.
–George Stephanopoulos
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Democrats and Obama created this mess with the banks by suing them into giving 400,000 dollar home loans to minorities making only 20,000 dollars a year.
Print the story right and with the facts. These Facts need explaining and this is what you should be asking Obama and the rest of the SWINE Democrats like Kennedy.
Posted by: same I AM a Democrat | January 25, 2009, 9:32 am 9:32 am
Re: Same I AM: Nice Limbaugh talking point, which I guess passes for “thought” in today’s discredited, irrelevant rump party GOP. I won’t bother to dismantle this absurdity, because I think folks like SAME I AM need to learn how to use Teh Google themselves. But really, is there anything the wingnuts won’t blame on Democrats, the poor, blacks or anyone but themselves and their failed policies?
Posted by: JamesJr | January 25, 2009, 9:46 am 9:46 am
JamesJr: please provide an example of a failed Republican banking policy. You forgot to give some. They exist indeed, but in a very rough nutshell Same I Am has a pretty accurate picture of the start of the problem.
Posted by: T-Rets | January 25, 2009, 10:07 am 10:07 am
Just watched the round table discussion on the recovery plans. Everybody, even George Will, talks about how bad the banks, who got us into this mess, need more help. But, no one is calling for the type of salary restrictions, requiring quickly made plans for restructuring (3 months or less), lowering of the salaries of the tellers, traders (similar to those required of the UAW), that have been required for the auto industry! I am a Democrat, as far as I am concerned the giving of more money to the Republican fat cats on Wall Street without strings is totally unacceptable. If these banks had used the $300 billion to free up credit, we wouldn’t have the problems with the auto industry that we have today.
Michigan has been a “donor” state (paying more in federal taxes than it received back in federal benefits) for all of my 66 years. Now it is the time for the nation to come to our aid. Yet all I hear so far is send the money to Wall Street, to the southern (anti-labor) states, to states where there are huge military bases, etc. If this economy is going to recover, the nation has to help the industrial Midwest recover. Until that is done, the economy will just continue to decline.
Posted by: Ken Kolk | January 25, 2009, 10:13 am 10:13 am
Are you people so out of touch with the average american as are all the politicians we keep putting in office.
It is a failed financial system that keeps failing every few decades or so.
There is only one fix!!! Change it and the business as usual attitude of politicians! FLAT TAX SYSTEM!!
EVEREYONE pays less at 5 to 8 percent out of their check directly with NO give backs or refunds.
Do I need to say more?
Posted by: Mike Decker | January 25, 2009, 11:53 am 11:53 am
Open to resolving the financial crisis? That’s pretty noble of you Nancy! And no accountability in the first $350 Billion? Well, who crafted the bill? CONGRESS!!!!! Quit playing partisan politics Pelosi!!!!
Posted by: LongT | January 25, 2009, 12:27 pm 12:27 pm
What happened to the Bush indicment Pelosi was going to bring for “breaking the law” on the first TARP? What a fruit cake this woman is! She is truely a partisan left wing partisan hack.
Posted by: LongT | January 25, 2009, 12:30 pm 12:30 pm
Is Horton Out There?
“Please Help My Son Find Horton”
I was talking to my son around Christmas about how bad the economy is and what to expect. About a week went by when he asked me, Mom if the banks are having a hard time why don’t they try to help the middle class and the middle class can help the banks. I’m sure that got a “I’m a dummy look” because he had to spell it out for me.
“Out of the mouth of Babes”
Mom we need a Horton and we need one now. If the banks would lower interest rate to 4.5% across the board that could save a lot of money for the consumer. This could be put back into the economy. This would not help the banks to much. But if you save $200.00 on your loan and you committed to the bank that you would put half of that money into stocks in their bank. This would build a good foundation for the bank. And help to start a retirement account for the home owner. Now mom you have $100.00 to put back into the economy.
Then he said it’s not much if only you make this deal with the bank, but if 100,000 people did this that would be 10 million a month for the bank to invest out into new loans, and 10 million into the economy from the consumers saving on the loan.
Then he said if the banks do not want anything to do with this then why are we giving them money from the stimulus package. That is the tax payers money right Mom.
I have been told all my life that a tree is only as strong as its roots. My son is right the banks and the people would be stronger if they help each other. If the banks say no then they should not get one red cent from the stimulus package.
I have to say my son is right; this is the tax payer’s money {stimulus package} that Our Government is giving away. So we as the tax payer should have a say!!!!!!!
One more thing you should know my son is in the 7th grade at R.U.L.H.Middle School and is going to be 13 on Feb.6, 2009. How sad that he is smarter than the big wigs in Washington D.C. spending our money.
Proud Mom
Ripley, Ohio
L.E.E.
If you don’t know the story of Horton Hears a Who! By: Dr.Seuss
In short Horton is able to hear the Who’s { Little People like You and Me}and he saved them from certain Doom. Please send this to anyone that you can think of that might be able to help.
Posted by: Leslie Evans | January 25, 2009, 12:32 pm 12:32 pm
I watched the Pelosi video. She didn’t answer the question! Kind of danced around with the same old rhetoric she seems to be so tie at the hip to.
Posted by: LongT | January 25, 2009, 12:36 pm 12:36 pm
I don’t know of any specific example of how the republicans caused this financial crisis, but everyone says that they caused the problem and, hey, if they say it on tv, it must be true.
Posted by: JamesJ | January 25, 2009, 1:29 pm 1:29 pm
Pelosi’s babbling is simply tragic.
Banks aren’t going to lend as long as there continues to be an immense and virtually unquantifiable liability out there for credit default swaps and other derivatives. These transactions should have never been legalized in the first place and should be nullified now. They are leveraged bets that should have never been made, and by the government paying them off, what we have is the greatest transfer of wealth from the general public to the rich (e.g., hedge funds) in the history of mankind. Capitol Hill talks plenty about “toxic assets,” but what about these toxic liabilities that are being paid off by the billions? Under current law, they can only be stopped by bankruptcy, which is what happened with Lehman. On the other hand, if they were nullified, the flow of cash out of the banks could be stopped without harming “good” creditors and bondholders. With that tap turned off, the banks could lend again, which would finally unfreeze the credit markets. Derivatives are a new kind of problem that need to be dealt with in a new and innovative way. Bankruptcy hurts everyone, as does continuing to pay these things off with taxpayer money. Let’s nullify them and leave the hedge funds holding the bag.
Posted by: Patrick Fleck | January 25, 2009, 2:19 pm 2:19 pm
Sure. Why don’t we just go sign our entire bank accounts and tax refunds over to the banks and be done with the whole mess? I’m sure there is a bank executive somewhere who is struck with terror about the possibility of losing his current status in life and becoming middle class instead.
Posted by: jan | January 25, 2009, 5:27 pm 5:27 pm
Ah typical political BS while American’s suffer. Whats new? These over paid, little worked politicians that can afford their mortgages, bills, groceries, car payments and health care are not the least concerned about anyone but themselves and the rich and big corps. Not that they are much different in their thinking than most people. This has become a very selfish, its all about me, country. Just look at the way people drive these days. Whatever happened to people acually caring about any one but themselves. So politicians are the same. I think Americans need to quit pointing fingers and waiting on help that probably will never come and start looking in the mirror and asking themselves, what can I do to help the economy, or help energy or even help my fellow more unfortunate American. I know! We are selfish and who cares about anyone but ourselves and family. Its a lot easier to just keep throwing blame and sit back and wait for the same people that got us in this mess to get us out. Oh yea! Maybe a lot of us are to blame too, with our over spending, poor finacial management, bad decisions. Na, lets just blame someone else and sit back and do nothing.Its so much easier to blame the republicans, dem’s , Palosi, Bush, Reid on and on. We will just keep voting them back in to office too. We like to pick up the National Enquier instead of a NewsWeek while waiting in a groercy line and then off to the polls we go and vote for a personailty, or a smile, or a great sales pitch. Thats the typical Amercan voter. So since we will just keep putting these people back in office and since we wont take any blame for the economic mess, I guess we deserve whatever comes our way.
Posted by: CAW | January 25, 2009, 5:59 pm 5:59 pm
Pelosi is depised by Americans. She is an embarrassment to the Democrats.
Posted by: CW | January 25, 2009, 6:23 pm 6:23 pm
Pelosi… where else could a complete waste of protoplasm like this even exist in politics but out on the LEFT coast?
She so supid, she couldn’t find water if she fell out of a boat… she couldn’t pour water out of a bucket if the instructions were written on the bottom… she… well, you get the point…
Thanks, California, for throwing this garbage away in Washington DC…
Posted by: Fiercely_Independent | January 26, 2009, 1:17 am 1:17 am
George!! Nice gane of softball… did you and Nancy go out and have a romantic dinner together after the show?
Did you get lucky and score??
Nice cougar you got there!!
How ’bout showing a little more integrity in your journalism!!!
Posted by: Fiercely_Independent | January 26, 2009, 1:34 am 1:34 am
George Stephanolpoulos’ interview with Nancy Pelosi? Pathetic… She manipulated the interview and avoided answering questions, makeing Stephanopoulos look like an amateur.
When Stephanopoulos questioned Pelosi about taxpayers who don’t pay income taxes getting a check, she answered that they do pay payroll taxes.
The contention that they pay no income taxes is accurate. The payroll tax is a different tax. Where was the follow up George to correct her and get her to answer the quetion?
There were many, many more istances of her manipulating the interview.
What a waste of my time……
Posted by: JAC | January 26, 2009, 3:11 am 3:11 am
Pelosi wants more money for banks. She will also want more money for the BIG 3 when they come back in March. This lady
is SENILE. She has zero approval rating.
PELOSI GO HOME..!!!
Posted by: CW | January 26, 2009, 6:35 am 6:35 am
Here is what happened..Bush deregulated banks, which became a breeding ground for predatory lending. I SAW people makeing less than $50g/yr getting APPROVED for nearly $1m. in housing loans, NO MONEY DOWN, NO INCOME QUALIF., BAD TERMS. The banks KNEW these people couldnt pay it back..didnt care..they then flipped it to wall st and SOLD THE PAPER, GOT ALL THEIR MONEY BACK. They also retained the houses and were GIVEN BILLIONS OF TAXPAYER DOLLARS. Then, they kicked back their govt. supporters, while makeing it look like they are broke. WHERE IS THE MONEY??? If you believe the bs crap you see on the news, i feel sorry for you. John and Mary lunchbox lost their homes, credit, billions of tax dollars THEY PAID,(the billion-dollar corps didnt pay taxes, they made campaign contributions)and their retirement (someone had to buy those bad loans!)Way to go washington. Its a bigger con than Madoff.
Posted by: Simon | January 26, 2009, 7:15 am 7:15 am
FOCK YOU NANCY PELOSI, YOU SMELLY, TUNA-CANT BATCH. I HATE YOUR FACE.
Posted by: Obama Direspector | January 26, 2009, 8:31 am 8:31 am
Pelosi is a moron. She has found the perfect career for her talents.
Posted by: Gotterdammerung | January 26, 2009, 8:59 am 8:59 am
My my; someone needs to change the kitty liter in the ABC sandbox. I agree Nancy is a mouthy mess, but grow up a bit folks. Any room left for intelligent debate?
Posted by: kseyetie | January 26, 2009, 9:57 am 9:57 am
Drudge must be so proud of his contituency. Maybe it’s just that he knows linking to Stephanopolis will get these brain-damaged mouth-breathers off his website.
Posted by: Silky | January 26, 2009, 10:07 am 10:07 am
I’m curious what specific gripes these people have with Nancy Pelosi.
Posted by: Silky | January 26, 2009, 10:14 am 10:14 am
TO KSEYETIE: what the fock!!! “is there any room left for intelligent debate?” You are a focking idiot, do you see or hear about anything intelligent anymore? is our government intelligent? NO so therefore, i deduce that you focking sock balls, also, FOCK YOU AND FOCK YOU TOO PELOSI. now for something intelligent: SHUT DOWN THE PRINTNG PRESS YOU FOCKIING MORON FEDERAL RESERVE AND MORON PELOSI AND MORON GOVERNMENT. YOU IDIOTS ARE SHRINKING MY SAVINGS BY WAY OF INFLATION YOU RETARDS!! STOP IT NOW. I ONLY MAKE 30k a year AND I HAVE A FAMILY TO FEED!!!!!!
Posted by: Obama Direspector | January 26, 2009, 10:53 am 10:53 am
Pelosi is an idiot!!!!! If the Banks want more money tell them to EARN IT!!
Posted by: lovingpolitics | January 26, 2009, 11:06 am 11:06 am
Shut TARP down now!
Oh yeah, the first half of the money did WONDERS at picking up the stock market and opening lines of credit… The market is still tanking and you need to have a credit score of near perfect to get any loan oh and don’t forget that all utilities and payment companies have now adopted a zero tolerance policy on bill payments. My cable bill was 1 week late and I received a disconnect notice…. I’ve been a “value” customer for almost a decade and now I’m one week late and being treated as if I were a bum on welfare.
Posted by: KindredNY | January 26, 2009, 12:20 pm 12:20 pm
I’m curious what specific gripes these people have with Nancy Pelosi.
LOL…..your kidding right?
Besides failing to get oversight into the TARP bill, she then turns around and blasts the adminstartion fo rspending it wrong. OVERSIGHT IS THE RESPONSIBITY OF THE CONGRESS!!!!!!
AS far as being any kind of leader, she threw that away when she let the House go home for Labor Day break whithout working out an energy bill. This at a time when the rest of us were staring at $5/Gal gasoline & home heating oil.
That one act of cowardice alone should be enough for anyone sane person!
Then we come to her & Reid running behind Obama’s back the day after the election to try to set-up a deal with the automakers.
By the way, has she produced any documentation as to were all that money is going? In a few weeks, the auto companies will have burned through that little pile of $$$, You think they will be ready to pay it back?…or ask for more?
Since Ms. Pelosi has made ZERO comments about the progress being made in Detroit, I would say its a safe bet that the auto makers will be back beggin again very soon!
And, just a nice little topper to this, she now thinks its a good idea to spend 600 million MORE dollars for the switchover to Digital TV that takes place in 3 weeks! Exactly how did she come to this number and EXACTLY how is this going to be spent. After all, there have been public service ads for well over a year now and also a government program to help offset the cost of converter boxes for those who need one.
Why Ms. Speaker do we NOW need to throw 600 MILLION more dollars at this issue?????
Posted by: Mike_C | January 26, 2009, 12:52 pm 12:52 pm
Will it ever stop?
Posted by: Lil Mel | January 26, 2009, 1:55 pm 1:55 pm
Speaker Pelosi is correct something has to been done to get bill passed how cares what the haters say
Posted by: Susan | January 26, 2009, 2:22 pm 2:22 pm
i think ms. pelosi is delusional from all the man broth she has been downing since going to d.c. we better take the reins from this freak before she totally sabotages our country. how about a flat tax and eliminating the federal reserve. than we could try and repair our currency by setting it to some sort of standard, probably not gold as our dollar is not worth gold. maybe silver or aluminum?
Posted by: Obama Direspector | January 26, 2009, 3:01 pm 3:01 pm
“Speaker Pelosi is correct something has to been done to get bill passed how cares what the haters say”
Susan,
That was the brilliant logic behind TARP and the auto bailout! That sure worked out well didn’t it?
Posted by: Mike_C | January 26, 2009, 4:55 pm 4:55 pm
Dear President Obama & Speaker Pelosi:
MORE money for the f’ing banks? Aw, c’mon now. The damn gummint has already thrown $350 billion, most of it to the financial industry, Citigroup being part of that, and what happens?
They (Citigroup, as reported on CNN Headline News Jan. 26, ’09)go out and buy a new corporate jet to the tune of $50 million, this for 12 people max; when quizzed about that they reply that they can’t talk about it because of
security concerns for their execs
and besides, they’ve reduced their fleet by two-thirds. Hey, I should be so lucky. I can get by on a lot less, now that I know how this “up yours” corporate game is played. All I need is about $75,000 for my Porsche Boxter-S and I’ll gladly get rid of the 2001 Honda Accord and the newer Honda Civic that my wife drives. See, I just did the same thing the Citigroup did and it didn’t cost the gummint nearly as much, plus I’ll gladly tell ‘em anything they want to know about the cars or whatever.
C’mon, President Obama. Please weigh in here and land one on the corporatocracy’s chin. Tell ‘em they can’t get away with this. Call in the TARP $’s they got, or at least $50 million of it plus interest.
WE THE PEOPLE got royally screwed during the last 8 years. You said, Mr. Obama, that “change we can believe in” wasn’t going to be business as usual.
I take issue with allowing the corporate devil dogs continued freedom to make their throw away statements from on high with impunity, in essence saying to the populous, “Eat cake, you stinking unwashed peasants.”
Posted by: George | January 27, 2009, 12:57 am 12:57 am
I loaned $1,000 to my brother-in-law and he never paid it back now I can’t pay my electric bill. Hey Nancy, would you give me a check to meet my needs? Oh yeah, because of the $1,000 deficit in my accounts I’ll need an additional $2,000 just to make sure it doesn’t happen again. Oh and I want to remodel my home office and buy that new Sport-Jet personal jet airplane so can you swing me a couple mil. No biggie right? It’ll help the economy. Think of all those construction and high tech aero-industry jobs I’ll be supporting. Just tell the tax payers it has to be done or the sky will fall.
Posted by: Rich | January 28, 2009, 12:14 pm 12:14 pm
Banking more money? I have been paying 100.00 dollars over min. payment on my credit card, they recently upped my payment almost $100.00 more saying gov’t says so to pay off credit card earlier. I said,”the bank set that % above my payment” they say no! Yet they still said I had 5,000.00 I could still charge. Their payment demand is out of my budget range Who do I go to? FIA says its the gov’t my congress person said it is the bank. What do I do
Posted by: Sharron | January 31, 2009, 1:09 am 1:09 am
I hear all about the monies to the banks and president Obama wanting the banks to lend the money out to regular people to boost the economy, but when you go to a bank to try to borrow money they plainly tell you, “You do not qualify” your credit is not good”. If this is a NEW ERA why can the goverment figure out a way to tell the banks that they need to lower the credit rating of regular people that has been affected and not go by the old credit rating??. If they lower the interest rates why can they lower the levels of credit?
Posted by: Eva | February 1, 2009, 11:16 am 11:16 am
Last week Starbucks announced cutbacks of 7,000 employees and the closing of hundreds of shops.
How many employee cutbacks and branch closing have Bank of American and Citi announced?
Of yes, B of A is “postponing” bonuses for 3 years.
Let’s hope neither is in business 3 years from now.
No more bail outs!
Posted by: from the raft | February 2, 2009, 7:24 am 7:24 am
So, they want to nationalize the banks? Then they’ll nationalize everything else and, shortly thereafter, there will be no one left to tax and we’ll consume ourselves. It’s funny how the politicians are starting to look like the people they try to blame for the problems. Much like the pigs in Animal Farm. Soon we’ll have ward bosses, bread lines, inferior products that will take years to deliver and a meltdown of the productivity of country.
Posted by: Jay | February 2, 2009, 3:59 pm 3:59 pm
If your credit is no good, you have only yourself to blame. You are probably like others who treat credit (loans) like income. Have you borrowed to make your rent or mortgage payment? Do you borrow to buy groceries? Do you not have at least 3 months (better to have 6 months) of income in liquid savings to get you through a rough time? Not my fault you spend, spend, spend. It’s not the government’s fault either (although many of them like it because you become one of their puppets). It is your fault and yours alone. Yes, I know there are some who run into temporary fixes caused by outside influences and that is why I volunteer and support charities that help people in such situations, such as the Salvation Army, Catholic Charities, etc.. How many of you put your money where your mouth is and help out by personal sacrifice. Or are you like Joe Biden and his ilk who don’t give to charity. They just want to use everybody else’s money.
Quit your crying and act like a man. Care for your fellow man and rely on yourself.
Posted by: Jay | February 2, 2009, 4:08 pm 4:08 pm
Simon said: Here is what happened..Bush deregulated banks
Actually, what happened is that in the ’70s President Carter had the Community Reinvestment Act put into law. Not a terrible thing until, during President Clnton’s time the bill was given more teeth. Then neighborhood groups threatened banks and thrifts with lawsuits, protests and other retaliatory actions unless they gave loans to previously redlined areas. When the companies started giving out these loans they were fearful of losing quite a bit of money so they started the Credit Default Swaps, where they paid people a portion of the income to insure these loans aganst default. To better sell them they bundled them with good loans so you had an average grade of B to B+ loans. 20% or so would be the subprime loans masked by the better loans. People started seeing a pretty good income from these “Swaps” and eventually the larger brokerage houses, Lehman was the biggest investor I believe, got deep into the market. Mortgage Brokers, with the pretty much upward progress of housing over the past few decades, felt fairly secure in writing large, little down, subprime mortgages. Many used Adjustable Rate Mortgages to make the first few years of payments easy, even for some of limited means. When the mortgages repriced and the subprime borrowers couldn’t make the new, larger payments, foreclosures started. This burst the housing bubble so foreclosures were causing large losses on the loans. Those with Credit Default Swaps saw they were about to be hit with enormous payouts and went bankrupt or just couldn’t make the payouts. This caused the brokerage houses holding these investments to lose enormous amounts of money.
Most probably didn’t read all of this but I just wanted to put it out there for informational purposes. It is a lot more complicated but it gives an idea of one of the many problems causing the credit crisis.
Posted by: Jay | February 2, 2009, 4:27 pm 4:27 pm
Simon, you said ” Here is what happened..Bush deregulated banks, ”
NAME one deregulation of banks, during the Bush administration ? I’ll wait for your answer…….
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