Cole: Bailout plan his "toughest" vote

By M. Scott Carter
The Moore American

WASHINGTON, D.C. October 01, 2008 10:23 am

— Calling it the “toughest he’s ever cast,” Oklahoma Congressman Tom Cole said his “yes” vote on Monday’s $700 billion financial bailout measure was necessary because the country faces the “most challenging economic times since the Great Depression.”
Rep. Cole, R-Moore, and Democratic Rep. Dan Boren were the only two members of Congress from Oklahoma to support the Bush administration’s $700 billion economic rescue package.
The legislation would have allowed the government to buy bad mortgages and other non-performing assets held by troubled banks and financial institutions. Experts believed getting those debts off bank balance sheets would strengthen the banks and make them more inclined to lend money.
Monday, the bill failed on the House floor by a 228-205 vote.
That failure sparked the largest stock sell-off on Wall Street since shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, The Associated Press said.
Tuesday, Cole said he was disappointed by the vote.
“They worked very hard,” he said. “And they dramatically improved the bill.”
And while Cole said he, too, would have voted against the original version — as written by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke — he said Monday’s version of the bill “wasn’t as much of a bailout as it was a Main Street rescue plan.”
“This has never been a bailout bill,” he said. “It’s more of an asset purchase or a fire sale. In recent days we have seen some of America’s largest and most storied financial institutions fail. And while the problems may have originated on Wall Street, the devastating impacts of these problems are beginning to be felt on Main Street.”
Tuesday, Congressional leaders — along with presidential rivals John McCain and Barack Obama — scrambled to prevent a further erosion of the economy.
Both Obama and McCain announced separately they supported a plan some lawmakers had pushed earlier: Raising the insurance limit on bank deposits from $100,000 to $250,000. Shortly after those announcements, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation chairman asked Congress for temporary authority to raise the limit by an unspecified amount.
But the country’s credit problem, Cole said, will take additional legislation to solve.
“This is a systemic crisis,” he said. “And this is what government is supposed to do. It’s not about one individual or one company. This is global. If the economy collapses across the board, that’s going to be felt at home. That drop in stock prices, that’s $1.4 trillion in wealth; that’s every pension fund in America.”
Still, Cole was optimistic that some type of rescue package could be passed.
“There are still a lot of votes to get out there,” he said. “And there are a couple of strategies: The speaker can try and pass the measure without GOP votes or the other strategy is to keep working with members and help them to understand the consequences.”
And while Cole said the measure isn’t the type of legislation he normally supports, he said this time it’s necessary.
“This isn’t what I want to do,” he said. “But right now, I can’t get 218 votes for the Tom Cole Five Point Plan. I don’t agree with this approach 99 times out of 100 — but I’m telling you that this is the 100th time.”
Cole isn’t alone.
Tuesday, President Bush, speaking from the White House, demanded that Congress act.
“I recognize this is a difficult vote for members of Congress,” the president said. “But the reality is we are in an urgent situation and the consequences will grow worse each day if we do not act.”
House GOP leaders said they welcomed McCain’s and Obama’s ideas and urged additional changes such as modifying “mark to market” accounting rules which require banks and other financial institutions to adjust the value of their assets to reflect current market prices, even if they plan to hold the assets for years.
Cole said he didn’t want to see a repeat of the Great Depression.
“Personally, this is the toughest vote that I have ever cast,” he said. “But I am convinced that it was the right thing to do for America and for the people I’m privileged to represent. I did not live through the Great Depression, but my parents and grandparents did. And, having lived through the tough times of the 1980s, sparked by bank failures and a real estate bust, I want to do all I can to see that our own children are spared such trials and hardships. I believe history will show that support for this bipartisan compromise was a tough vote, but the right vote.”
The Associated Press contributed to this story.