Posted on 10/10/2008 10:07:06 AM PDT by Born Conservative
The economy is more important than an election, Rep. Paul Kanjorski said Wednesday, defending his support of the more than $700 billion economic bailout package that passed in the Senate last Wednesday and the House of Representatives last Friday.
“I made the commitment to support it knowing full well that it could have a very significant negative effect on my re-election,” Kanjorski said after meeting with constituents at his campaign office on South Main Street in Wilkes-Barre. “But look, I’m elected to Congress to do the right thing, not to get re-elected.”
Hazleton Mayor Lou Barletta, who is challenging Kanjorski, D-Nanticoke, in the 11th Congressional District, this week released an internal poll of 400 likely voters that showed he holds an eight-point lead over the 12-term incumbent.
Last week, as public sentiment turned against the bailout package, Barletta’s campaign began running a television commercial highlighting Kanjorski’s support of the bill. The commercial tied the vote to contributions Kanjorski received from Wall Street-based financial companies.
Kanjorski, the chairman of the House Financial Services Subcommittee on Capital Markets, Insurance, and Government Sponsored Enterprises, said he consulted with financial experts and academics across the country before he decided on the bailout package and determined, “It was very clear to me this was an extraordinarily serious event that had to be resolved positively.
“I ultimately have to decide what is the right and best thing to do, even if it has a negative effect on my re-election,” Kanjorski said. “In this instance, there was no question in my mind that the right thing to do was to try and save the American economy and that’s what I voted to do.”
“Everything’s crashing around us,” he added. “There can’t be any question in people’s minds that this can be catastrophic to the American economy.”
The bailout package failed by a 205-228 margin when it first went to a vote in the House last Monday. According to Fivethirtyeight.com, a repository of election data, 30 of the 38 representatives in the most competitive House races voted against the bill, including Rep. Chris Carney, D-Dimock Township.
Carney, who is facing Republican challenger Chris Hackett in the 10th Congressional District, defended his decision to vote against the bailout plan twice during meetings this week with the editorial boards at The Citizens’ Voice and The Scranton Times-Tribune.
Carney called for a salary cap for the executives in charge of the companies, such as the insurance giant AIG, that will survive with the government’s bailout. Carney said he would set a ceiling for executives’ annual salaries at between $160,000 and $175,000 — about the same as members of Congress.
“I think we should not be spending taxpayer dollars to pay millions of dollars in salaries to these people,” Carney said Wednesday during his meeting with The Citizens’ Voice editorial board.
Carney’s proposal would significantly drop the salaries of chief executives from the millions they currently receive. Carney said he did not think such a low salary would in anyway reduce the qualified applicant pool for such jobs.
“At least taxpayers would be getting someone presumably on their side, watching what’s going on,” Carney said.
He received the 7th highest amount of campaign contributions from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac amongst Congress crooks since 1989, and he's a "friend" of Charlie Rangel.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0907/5667.html
http://www.tradingmarkets.com/.site/news/Stock%20News/1894023/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ARFkbNiAss
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/08/01/eveningnews/main4316199.shtml
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2090031/posts
thanks.
more people need to know about cash n’ carry.
http://www.treas.gov/organization/bios/kashkari-e.html
“Prior to joining the Treasury Department, Mr. Kashkari was a Vice President at Goldman, Sachs & Co. in San Francisco, where he led Goldman’s IT Security Investment Banking practice, advising public and private companies on mergers and acquisitions and financial transactions.”
Goldman Sacs Presidential Campaign Donation Comparison
Goldman Sachs
% to Dems = 73 % to GOP = 27
http://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/summary.php?id=D000000085
http://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/toprecips.php?id=D000000085
Sachs is Obama’s largest contributor
http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/contrib.php?cycle=2008&cid=N00009638
Kanjorski is just as much a thief as the other Dems with their hands in the pot; he’s just more low profile about it.
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