Warner: GOP, McConnell should bring 'specific suggestions' , the fund truly is a death panel

Warner: GOP, McConnell should bring 'specific suggestions' to financial regulatory debate
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/92865-warner-gop-mcconnell-should-bring-specific-suggestions-to-financial-regulatory-debate

Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) on Sunday implored Republicans to resume negotiating financial regulatory reforms with "specific suggestions" in mind, not just general criticisms.

During an interview on CNN's "State of the Union," Warner said those discussions would be essential in meeting his "hope that we can get a bill that will get 75 votes."

The Virginia Democrat, who sits on the Senate Banking Committee, has been at the center of the debate over the legislation's proposed liquidation fund, which would ensure failed firms can be winded down without harming the larger economy. Senate Republicans, especially GOP Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.), have recently derided that initiative as merely a back door for taxpayer bailouts.

But Warner said the fund, paid into only by financial firms, "truly is a death panel," adding it would function as an essential "trip wire" preventing further economic trouble. However, he signaled he would support relaxing that provision, provided Republicans proposed an idea of how to do it.



http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2010/04/18/mcconnell-theres-a-bailout-fund-in-current-wall-st-reform-bill/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%20%3Cimg%20src&fbid=uKKzBbg7zlQ

“There is a bailout fund in the bill that was reported out of the Banking Committee,” McConnell said, “the partisan bill that came out of committee on a party line vote. I don’t think that’s in dispute.”

When reminded by CNN Chief Political Correspondent Candy Crowley that the money in the disputed fund would be provided by banks themselves rather than taxpayers, McConnell responded, “Regardless of where the – how the money is produced, it is a bailout fund that sort of guarantees in perpetuity that we’ll be intervening once again to bail out these big firms.”