Paul Wellstone Mental Health and Addiction Equity Act of 2008

Floor Speech

PAUL WELLSTONE MENTAL HEALTH AND ADDICTION EQUITY ACT OF 2008 -- (Senate - October 01, 2008)

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. SCHUMER. Madam President, first, I wish to compliment my colleague from Illinois, Barack Obama. His speech was not only on the money, but the way he has handled himself throughout this crisis has been nothing short of Presidential. He has been erudite, he has been thoughtful, he has been effective, he has been behind the scenes, no showboating, no big statements, untrue to what he is. He was perfect.

Now I rise to support the legislation before us. It has become clear over the past few months we live in amazing and dangerous times. Who would have ever thought that the lowly mortgage, long regarded as the safest of investments, could bring our financial system to its knees.

The system was overleveraged, overextended, overoptimistic. Now we are all paying the price. But that is where we are. While we must look back and see what went wrong, we also have to look forward--that is our immediate task--and try to avoid a meltdown.

As we confront this crisis, we are faced with dangers on both sides; Scylla, the proverbial monster, from doing nothing, a real danger; Charybdis, the whirlpool, from doing the wrong thing. It is as bad to do the wrong thing as to do nothing.

There are real dangers to inaction. Chairman Bernanke held us spellbound in the Speaker's office Thursday night when he described the conditions of the economy, without hyperbole, without raising his voice. His discussion was, in short, frightening. Our economy's body is in terrible shape because its arteries, the financial system, is clogged. It will cause a heart attack, maybe in a day, maybe in 6 months, but we will get a heart attack for sure if we do not act.

So we must act. Unfortunately, when we act, we are not just acting for Wall Street. Unfortunately, Wall Street, with all its excesses, is connected to Main Street. Right now, you cannot get a car loan if you do not have a FICO score, a credit rating score that is very high, 720.

If that stays, we will sell 6 million fewer cars this year, and tens of thousands of workers in Buffalo, in Detroit, and St. Louis will be laid off through no fault of their own. That is not right. That is not fair. That is the system in which we live.

If we do nothing, we hurt innocent workers, millions, even though they were not to blame. But there was also the danger of Charybdis, doing something wrong. Let's make no mistake about it. The plan Secretary Paulson first presented was awful--$700 billion, a blank check, an auction: you let me do it, I will figure it out, even exemptions from breaking the law, the language seemed to say.

Through the hard work of the chairman and many of us on the Banking Committee, both sides of the aisle, the other house, we changed it. There is real tough oversight. There is protection for the taxpayers. Senator Reid did an amazing job in getting warrants written in the bill that are mandatory and tough. The taxpayer will come first, before the bondholder, before the shareholder, before the executive.

We worked hard as well to limit executive compensation. It is not everything the Senator from Montana, the chair of Finance, and I wanted in the negotiations but a good, large first step. We broke down the amount. There will have to be congressional approval for the second $350 billion. There will be a requirement that the President notify for $100 billion. So the first amount of money, $250 billion is given with this legislation, another $100 billion for the President, if he certifies real need; but $350 billion subject to congressional disapproval. Even if we are out of session, we will come back.

So the legislation was improved, and it was logical to improve it; $700 billion is a lot of money, even on Wall Street. None of the thousands of money managers would invest that sum without appropriate due diligence. There were times when the Secretary of the Treasury was saying: You do not have to do due diligence. We deferred.

So to Secretary Paulson's TARP proposal we have added some important provisions, THO, taxpayer protection, housing and oversight. The new additions add, because the new additions are AMT relief--I ask unanimous consent for an additional minute. I thought I was supposed to get 6.

Mr. DODD. I will give the Senator an additional minute.

Mr. SCHUMER. Thank you. We have added THO, taxpayer protection, money for homeowners and real oversight. And now more. The new additions Senator Reid came up with will be money directly to Main Street, money for businesses that invest to create jobs during a time of economic downturn, tax breaks for new kinds of energy--solar, wind--that our economy awaits, relief from the AMT, which affects not the wealthy but in New York, at least, people making $50,000, $75,000, $100,000, $125,000 who were paying too much under the AMT.

So this package is an improvement. Is it the way I would have written it? No. Is it the way any of us would have individually written it? No. But given the improvements, this package is better, significantly better than doing nothing. I hope we will get strong bipartisan support tonight, I hope we will get strong bipartisan support in the House, and then we will move on to make the regulatory changes so this never happens again.

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