MSNBC "Hardball with Chris Matthews" - Transcript

Interview

MSNBC "Hardball with Chris Matthews" - Transcript

MR. MATTHEWS: Welcome back to "Hardball" live in St. Louis, where the vice presidential running mates debate tonight before this crowd out here. By the way, now that the Senate has passed a bailout bill with some added measures, will the new rescue package be able to win over House members who originally voted against it on Monday? Republican Congressman Darrell Issa of California -- (inaudible) -- voted against the bailout bill and plans to vote against it again, and Democratic Congressman Kendrick Meek of Florida voted for it and will do so again.

Let me start with Congressman Issa. The Dow Jones dropped 350 points today, sir. Are you concerned the defeat of that bill again will cause a real catastrophe on Wall Street?

REP. ISSA: Chris, the Dow Jones has dropped over 3,500 points from its peak less than a year ago. You can't blame any one thing in the economy. But if we want to talk about fixing the Dow Jones and fixing the bond rates and so on, what we have to talk about is providing the appropriate liquidity, which is far larger than this bailout. I am all for acting. What we've said all along is that this administration, for whatever reason, has said give us the money and pretty much go away. We've said, if you have tools, tell us how you're going to use the tools you already have, and they've refused to do so fairly blatantly.

MR. MATTHEWS: Let me go right now to Congressman Meek of Florida. Congressman, well, you're going to vote for it again, right? Have you taken heat for voting for it the first time?

REP. MEEK: Well, I think the American people have had an opportunity to see what happens when inaction takes place. We knew that they would really hit the market real hard and it will hit Main Street. As we stand right now, some student loan companies are not even providing loans now. Small businesses are laying people off. We lost $1 trillion last week in that 15-minute vote cycle when that bill was voted down. Doing nothing is not necessarily an option.

We also have a very active, two chairmen in both House and Senate that are working day and night to make sure that this bill is enacted in an appropriate way. All eyes will be on the Department of Treasury. The $700 billion will not all be released at one time. But it will allow the federal government to be able to work with Treasury and the bad paper that's out there, buy it, and hopefully negotiate with homeowners, so those that are facing foreclosure right now and try to refinance those mortgages. That language is actually in the bill.

REP. ISSA: Chris, nothing can be --

MR. MATTHEWS: Congressman Issa, again --

REP. ISSA: Nothing can be further -- nothing could --

MR. MATTHEWS: Again, will you vote against this bill if your vote is critical?

REP. ISSA: I will be voting --

MR. MATTHEWS: If you hold the crucial vote, will you do it again?

REP. ISSA: You know, first of all, I need to straighten out the fact that all Kendrick intends and would like to have the Treasury do something about mortgages, the assets they're buying do not have mortgage control inherent in any one piece of paper or any one bank. So the paper they're buying is not going to give them the ability to deal with individual homeowners. That just isn't true. It isn't true because of the nature of the instruments that are in trouble that they're buying. These derivatives do not own mortgages, they own a portion of mortgage-backed securities and they don't have the ability to act or reassemble a mortgage.

My intention is to continue to the very last minute fighting to have common sense prevail and either have this bill changed, which seems unlikely, or have the administration agree to do some of the things they have the power to do that right now they're still not doing.

REP. MEEK: Darrell, I have a copy of the amendment that you're trying to offer now at the last minute. As you know, the Senate is not going to take it up and I think it's a very good amendment of saying that foreign investors can't take part in this piece of legislation. But I think it's important for us to realize that in Main Street America this is hitting hard right now. No one thinks that this bill is the silver bullet, but I can say this, it does allow us -- and I just left the committee and also left one of -- the chair, Barney Franks, who has just shared with me and showed me the language -- so I'll be happy to show it to you and show how this can work. The language is not as hard as we would like to see it, but I think it's important. We cannot afford to have this bill go down one more time to see another $1 trillion leave the market and to see interest rates go up or inflation go up to where there're people can't buy cars, they can't buy homes, they can't save their homes.

But I look forward to the vote tomorrow and I think what you'll see is a number of members that voted against the legislation that will vote for it this time for various reasons -- maybe the new language out of the Senate or maybe they saw what happened to their constituents, especially those that are retired. Darrell, both of us are from retirement states -- California, I'm from Florida, and there are a lot of people that are very, very concerned about what's happening right now. But I respect those who have voted for it and against it.

REP. ISSA: Well, Kendrick is absolutely right. He's absolutely right that, in fact, many people will change their decision tomorrow.

MR. MATTHEWS: We're out of time, sir. Okay. You expect -- both you gentlemen, quickly, will the bill pass tomorrow -- the bailout bill in the House? Mr. Issa first.

REP. MEEK: Yes, it will.

REP. ISSA: I believe so.

MR. MATTHEWS: Mr. Meek, will it pass?

REP. MEEK: Yes, it will.

MR. MATTHEWS: Okay, you both said it will pass. Thank you very much, Congressman Darrell Issa of California and Congressman Kendrick Meek of Florida. We'll be right back with the crowd here at Wash. U. You're watching "Hardball."

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