January 8, 2009
- Pasco, Washington
Murray: It's time to eat our vegetables
The Dow Jones news ticker is reflected on a window at NASDAQ just before the closing bell, Monday, Oct. 6, 2008 in New York's Times Square. By Bryan Johnson
SEATTLE -- U.S. Senator Patty Murray, D-Wash., helped push the $700-billion bailout bill through Congress. She admits it wasn't easy to vote yes.
Murray used to be a preschool teacher. In making her decision, the senator says she thought back to those days during which she had to convince kids that the foods they hated was just the stuff they had to eat. Murray didn't really like the bailout plan. "I'm not happy with any of this," she said. "I am as angry as anybody that we are in this situation but sometimes you've got to eat your vegetables and boy, this is one of those times." The senator says Wall Street greed may have got us where we are, and she might have wanted to make the bad guys go stand in the corner. "If this was just an issue about slapping them, I think the vote in Congress would be overwhelming to slap them. But the truth is that the fallout from the economic crisis is hitting everyone," she said. Murray knows businesses are hurting, and that means jobs are getting cut. College kids can't get loans. And the housing market needs help. She says the bailout money won't start flowing for weeks and warns there are hard times ahead. Economist Chris Weber at Seattle University says the biggest problem is that everyone's confidence has been shaken. "I think confidence is huge here. If people believe that markets are going to fall, they sell and markets fall," he said. Weber warns if people think a recession looms, they start spending less. That, he says, could trigger a recession. "I'm thinking about buying a new car, I'd like to buy a new car, but I'm waiting until everything gets a little better," said Jennifer Johnson. Economists say to get out of the mess we are in, more people need to be more optimistic. But, they add, the country also needs better regulation to reign in the greed and unbridled speculation that got us into trouble. And Murray tells me that is a priority for Congress -- finding out what went wrong and fixing it so this will never happen again. |
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