I believe that it is functionally a bill of attainder, but since the victims are defined by characteristics rather than by the name of individuals or a company, they can probably get away with it.
Ms. PELOSI. I thank the gentleman for yielding, and I thank him for his leadership in bringing this legislation to the floor and his ongoing leadership in protecting the national interest of the American people as chairman of the Financial Services Committee.
[Time: 14:00]
And today with these two resolutions, I think that we are making two important statements. One is that the administration should continue in its efforts to recover the money and prevent these bonuses from going forward. And the other is that we want our money back and we want our money back now for the taxpayers. This isn’t that complicated. It isn’t that complicated.
There are other steps that we can take, and in working in a bipartisan way on the committees of jurisdiction, the Financial Services Committee for one, we will have other pieces of legislation which will ensure that this can never happen again. We’re working with the Judiciary Committee to say when is the national interest so offended that it is okay, then, to revisit a contract?
You hear all this talk about, oh, we can’t revisit contracts. It’s the Constitution. And we respect that, and we would not do so unless we would do so very carefully. But nobody seems to have a problem saying to auto workers in Michigan that their contracts must be revisited, that they have to take a deep cut in order to sustain an industry because that industry is important to our national security; we must have a manufacturing base and we cannot have it be undermined. So if the workers contracts are so subject to review and revision, why is it that when somebody gives a contract for a bonus to somebody for failure which is known not to be in the national interest that you can’t even bring up the subject?
Wll, that isn’t the subject for today in terms of legislation, but the subject of fairness and justice is.
...let’s take a step and say we want our money back. Here’s one way to get it. And then let’s work together to do more in that regard to bring justice to the system but, more importantly, to work together to bring stability to our economy.
With that, I urge our colleagues to support the resolutions before us.
http://www.thomas.gov/cgi-bin/query/F?r111:71:./temp/~r111B168UL:e55495:
From the Speakers mouth to the Supreme Courts Ears
Well, that isn’t the subject for today in terms of legislation, but the subject of fairness and justice is.
And then let’s work together to do more in that regard to bring justice to the system but,