MSNBC "The Ed Show" - Transcript

Interview

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SCHULTZ: Welcome back to THE ED SHOW. Thanks for watching tonight. I"ve been saying this for months, that giving small businesses access to cheap money is going to change the entire dynamic about this economic recovery that we want. Now some members of the Congress are starting to figure this thing out that, you know, this is the way we"ve to go. Today, the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations met with small business leaders in Michigan, where they need help, to talk about increasing their access to loans.

Democratic Congressman Gary Peters of Michigan was at the hearing tonight, held it. Congressman, great to have you with us tonight.

REP. GARY PETERS (D), MICHIGAN: Great to be with you, Ed.

SCHULTZ: You bet. Does this idea of, maybe--since we"re going to send 30 billion dollars over to Afghanistan at the drop of a hat--maybe get a few billion for small business, and maybe some type of fast-track via the Small Business Administration? Maybe even get them out of it and start something new to loosen up these credit markets? What about that?

PETERS: You"re absolutely right, Ed. That is the way we have to proceed. It"s--small businesses create most of the jobs in this country. It"s certainly going to be how we"re going to get out of this economic problem we have in Michigan right now. It"s going to be driven by small-business owners. Small businesses are particularly hurt with the credit crunch, because they rely on banks more than anybody else. The big businesses, they can go to the capital markets. They can go to the stock exchange. They can issue corporate debt.

Small businesses need to go to banks to get those loans. If we"re going to create jobs, and if they"re going to create jobs, they need to have access to credit. And quite frankly, they"re not getting it.

SCHULTZ: How do we fix that? Congressman, how do we fix that? The banks aren"t going to change the way they do business. Is this going to take nationalizing and having a United States Bank that works directly with small business?

PETERS: Well, I think part of it--what came out very clear in our hearing today--we had small business-people, but also the small banks, the community banks, the credit unions that are in the communities. It"s really very clear, the big-money center banks, those banks that have been getting billions of taxpayer money, are abandoning areas like we have in Michigan and other high-unemployment areas. They"re taking our deposits but they"re investing it somewhere else.

However, it"s the community banks, they have nowhere to go. They"re in the community. They"re local business-people, themselves. That"s where the help needs to go. And there needs to be infusion of capital to help those banks. Instead, we have regulators now making it very difficult for those community banks, actually making tougher standards for them, forcing them to call in their credit lines at a time when we need to be putting money into the hands of small business-people. The strategy involves the SBA. It involves community banks and credit unions.

SCHULTZ: Congressman, what you said in the last 30 seconds is exactly where America is right now. It"s part of a double standard. There"s a different set of rules for the community banks. They"re being just absolutely lassoed by the regulators. The only way that"s going to turn around is if somebody in the federal government frees up the money and changes the regs and gets this on the fast track.

PETERS: Absolutely.

SCHULTZ: That is it. That is it.

PETERS: Absolutely, Ed. You"re absolutely right. It was very clear. We"re going to be coming back in the next couple weeks with a variety of policy options, right as a result of what was very good testimony in the hearing today.

SCHULTZ: Congressman, great to have you on. Thank you.

PETERS: Great to be with you, Ed. Thank you.

SCHULTZ: In advance of President Obama"s big jobs summit this week, the White House is trying to show that they"re paying attention to this economic crisis on Main Street. The administration announced today that they"re going to start cracking down on mortgage companies. They"ve threatened imposing fines or sanctions unless lenders permanently reduce payments for troubled homeowners.

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