Sunday Sound: Heard on 'This Week'
The most notable comments made Sunday on "This Week"
NEW YORK, MAY 13, 2012— -- Below are some of the notable comments made Sunday on "This Week with George Stephanopoulos."
Sunday Sound: Heard on This Week
Rep. Barney Frank
1) FRANK: I expected the president to be supporting same-sex marriage, because, frankly, of the absence of any good reason against it, once you believe that people ought to be treated fairly. The big step forward was when the president said, correctly, earlier this year that the Defense of Marriage Act provision that said, when a state recognizes marriages, the federal government will discriminate and -- and refuse benefits to some of the married people that the state recognizes and not others. That was the major federal policy. Once he said that was unconstitutional, I think the -- the next step followed logically
2) FRANK: I do have to note that this Republican talking point, that women have lost jobs, the job losses came about because of the terrible recession that non-regulation in the economy brought about under George Bush. We have been gaining jobs since then.
3) Frank hopes the Volcker Rule would prevent the type of behavior that JP Morgan Chase engaged in that led to a $2 billion trading loss announced last week:
FRANK: That is, the Volcker rule is still being formulated. It's a complicated thing. Part of the problem, frankly, is that the Republicans, while they have plenty of money to spend on international military adventures that haven't worked out well, have reduced the funding that we've asked for…….I hope that the final rule will prevent this. There were other factors in the rule that are going forward. Years ago, what happened was, agencies, entities like JPMorgan Chase, made bets on derivatives and then couldn't pay for it. We now have rules that say, no, you can't get yourself in that position.
Rep. Marsha Blackburn
Mitt Romney's Stance this Election
4) BLACKBURN: I think that you can go back and look at Supreme Court cases, you can look at the institution of marriage, and you know that Mitt Romney, who has always fought for traditional marriage, is going to continue to do this.
5) BLACKBURN: I think that what you're going to see Mitt Romney do is put the focus on jobs and the economy. And, George, you're talking about this is Mother's Day. We've got nearly 858,000 women that have lost their jobs under this president. And you have women that are concerned about the loss in household income under this president, nearly $4,000 per household. Those are the issues that are first and foremost in front of people, is making certain that jobs and the economy is the focus.
The Roundtable
The "This Week" powerhouse roundtable debated all the week's politics, with Republican strategist Mary Matalin, former New York governor and host of Current TV's "Viewpoint" Eliot Spitzer, Faith and Freedom Coalition founder and chairman Ralph Reed, Democratic strategist Hilary Rosen, and Politico senior political reporter Maggie Haberman.Responding to Obama's Support for Same-Sex Marriage
6) ROSEN: …. You know, when I think about it personally, I came out at 17. The idea that a president of the United States would ever say that I could have that kind of a relationship, when all I was trying to do was figure out how, you know, just to sort of walk down the street without worrying about it. And -- and I think that kind of clarity, that kind of leadership, it was a politically risky move for the president to take. The fact that he did it I think is really admirable.
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