David Gergen Wants Americans to Think Disruptions in the Financial Markets Are Normal
Wolf Blitzer asked David Gergen for his perspective on Wall Street reform and apparently Gergen wants the American public to think that a series of booms and busts is normal.
BLITZER: Our senior political analyst David Gergen for some perspective.
David, can we now simply assume that there will be Wall Street reform?
GERGEN: I think so, Wolf. There are a couple of contentious issues still to resolve. Consumer protection and derivative, both very important. But this bipartisan agreement today will end the filibuster.
CNN has learned that Republican Senator Susan Collins will now vote to end the filibuster. I'm sure other Republicans will join her. That will really pave the way not only to a debate, but final passage of a bill, and the biggest -- the biggest reform of the financial industry since the Great Depression.
BLITZER: Can they clean up their act, if you will, and do the kinds of things that will prevent what happened a year and a half, two years ago?
GERGEN: That's a very important question. Nobody knows the answer, Wolf. What we do know, Hank Paulson when he was treasury secretary said we'll have disruptions in the financial markets about every four or five years. That's just the nature of capitalism. The question is are they now putting the safeguards in place to prevent the next disruption or the one after from turning into a great recession and throwing so many people out of work. The hopes are that they will and that they've done a lot of good things and this is a very dynamic, capitalistic system and things, you do have sort of these eruptions, periodically and you can't be absolutely certain, but the country backs us, Wolf. Notably some banks. We've learned now that Citigroup as well as UBS and Morgan Stanley backed these financial reform and most economists say that it will make us safer.
BLITZER: We are told, by the way, that the vote on the Senate floor to move forward and allow this debate to actually begin on the Senate floor will happen within the next hour. We'll of course, watch that closely, David. So the Obama administration and the Democrats get health care reform. They're probably going to get some sort of financial reform right now, but when you look towards November and the midterm elections, doesn't the economy and jobs, don't that really represent the top priorities that the Democrats need to make sure they don't do as bad as some expect?
GERGEN: Absolutely, on that issue, the jury is still out. We still have a very stubbornly high unemployment rate. We'll be watching those numbers very closely in the months ahead.
BLITZER: David Gergen will be watching with us every step of the way. David, thanks very much.
Sorry David, but there's someone who's not a Villager hack named Thom Hartmann who would disagree with you.
