President Obama Pushes Wall Street Reform
SANCHEZ: Welcome back. I'm Rick Sanchez. You talk about hot- button issues, how about financial reform? Ali is going to be here to take us through this, and what we're talking about, this is interesting, because, in many ways, it's what you tell me, that you wait to see what's going to happen Monday, because they're going to have a test vote to see how this thing is going to go.</s>VELSHI: Yes, see if it can pass the Senate, yes.</s>SANCHEZ: Exactly. Now, this vote to start debate should give us a pretty good idea as to whether reforms might pass and in what form. Now, that's Monday. And, obviously, we're going to be all over this thing. Let me take you back to yesterday, though. This is something that made me think. This is President Obama. He's talking to Wall Street bankers, right? Remember, everybody covered this thing? I was working on my book. I wasn't here. But take a listen.</s>OBAMA: I'm here because I believe that these reforms are, in the end, not only in the best interests of our country but in the best interests of the financial sector.</s>SANCHEZ: He just said that reform is in the best interests of the financial sector, translation, Wall Street. And that made me wonder, unless you work on Wall Street, who -- who gives a hoot? I mean, why is the president of the United States...</s>VELSHI: Go back.</s>SANCHEZ: Go ahead.</s>VELSHI: Rewind to September of 2008, when there was a massive credit freeze, and we were saying companies couldn't raise money, they couldn't get credit. And do you know how many people said to me, who cares? And they wrote to their congressman and they called them and they said don't pass this bailout bill. I don't need to be rescuing those fat cats.</s>SANCHEZ: Yes.</s>VELSHI: Fast-forward. Two months later, we're in the deepest recession we have been in, in generations. We have lost jobs. When the financial sector doesn't do well, and money isn't flowing, it's like who cares that oil isn't going to all the parts in your car? The fact is, we live in a world that exists for money and our financial sector is how we spread that money around to companies that need loans and hire people. So, we do need to care. We have to make sure that, while we're mad at them, we don't shut them down. That happened with the credit crisis. And we paid the price.</s>SANCHEZ: Is this president in any way indebted, is he linked to Wall Street inextricably?</s>VELSHI: I don't think any more than any other elected politician is. They all get loans -- they all get donations from workers.</s>SANCHEZ: Yes, campaign funds, yes.</s>VELSHI: Campaign funds.</s>SANCHEZ: They're lobbied.</s>VELSHI: They're lobbied.</s>SANCHEZ: Right.</s>VELSHI: I didn't think he's any more or any less. But we are all connected to the financial sector. So, I think what he was saying wasn't, this is good for you at someone else's expense. He was saying, you think this is bad for you and good for Main Street. It's good for Main Street and it's good for Wall Street.</s>SANCHEZ: But it's hard to be an American right now and not feel put upon by these SOBs in many ways.</s>VELSHI: Totally right. Totally right. Totally right.</s>SANCHEZ: So, I want you to listen to this. You and I have talked about these Moody's ratings that, suddenly, they bundled a bunch of mortgages, and they got AAA or AAAA ratings for something that wasn't worth junk.</s>VELSHI: Yes.</s>SANCHEZ: Listen to Carl Levin talking about the role of the rating agencies today. This is out of the Rick Sanchez playbook, by the way. Let's listen to it together.</s>VELSHI: Yes.</s>SANCHEZ: Hit it, Rog.</s>SEN. CARL LEVIN (D), MICHIGAN: The credit rating agencies were operating with an inherent conflict of interest, because the revenues they pocketed came from the companies whose securities they raided. It's like one of the parties in court paying the judge's salary or one of the teams in a competition paying the salary of the referee.</s>SANCHEZ: OK. Now, it happened, right?</s>VELSHI: Yes, totally.</s>SANCHEZ: It happened. All right, here's the better question. Is this new legislation, have you had a chance to take a look at it to make sure that something like this doesn't happen again?</s>VELSHI: Well, there's lots -- this is a bit like health care.</s>SANCHEZ: ... things?</s>VELSHI: Well, there's a bill that passed the House in December and then there are two bills in two Senate committees. So, the Senate is going to have to reconcile that, pass one of them, then they're going to have to reconcile them both. So, the Senate bill is actually tougher than the House bill. But to answer your question specifically, there's a whole lot of stuff that happened in the last two years that is not addressed by this legislation at all.</s>SANCHEZ: Great. Wonderful.</s>VELSHI: But what could change, Rick, again, you deal with this in your book, which is fantastic, when it comes out...</s>SANCHEZ: Yes.</s>VELSHI: ... is that there just isn't a mood of -- there hasn't been a culture of regulation on Wall Street for more than 15 years, so this may just impose the idea that even if you don't change laws, get the cops out there and start getting them to enforce the laws.</s>SANCHEZ: Yes.</s>VELSHI: You have seen cities where the murder rate goes down just because cops start walking around. They didn't change any laws. Murder was always illegal.</s>SANCHEZ: And then there's the regulators. And, boy, have we got a story for you on that. Thanks, by the way. You got to catch a flight. Get out of here.</s>VELSHI: Have a good weekend. Yes. All right.</s>SANCHEZ: See you later. Thanks for stopping.</s>VELSHI: Yes, no problem.</s>SANCHEZ: I want to show you some of these pics coming in from Arizona. We have been all over this. These are young kids for the most part. I was just hearing something there, guys. That wasn't for me, right? OK. Good. So, we're going to be all over the Arizona story. We're expecting the governor is going to be coming out in less than an hour now and she's going to be either telling us she's going to sign this bill or she's not going to sign this bill. A lot of anticipation on both sides, and we're going to have it covered for you. Also, what were some at the SEC doing? This is what I was just alluding to with Ali. These are regulators, folks, and right during the financial meltdown, would you believe they were watching hours and hours of porn? That's coming up. And then something we watched yesterday that was amazing, as part of what happens in England. And someone tied to English politics is our most intriguing person of the day. Who is it? Can you think? Can you help us? Stay there. You will find out.