GOPers want commission on financial meltdown

An independent financial oversight committee should be established to examine what led to the economic meltdown, House Republicans on the Oversight and Government Reform Committee said Wednesday.

The GOPers want a bipartisan committee established to examine the crisis and to report on how to prevent a similar collapse in the future.

{mosads}GOP Reps. Darrell Issa (Calif.), Tom Davis (Va.), Mark Souder (Ind.), Christopher Shays (Conn.) and Brian Bilbray (Calif.) told reporters that they would introduce legislation to form the Financial Oversight Commission, an independent entity that could build upon investigations by the executive branch and Congress, evaluate whether the United States was adequately prepared to deal with the collapse and issue a report on their findings.

Issa said the panel would differ from a commission to oversee the allocation of the $700 billion rescue package passed by Congress on Oct. 3, and was intended to ensure that future financial issues would not spin out of control.

“These commissioners are intended not to be partisan, they are intended to be former members, financial experts and so on …because we want this to [include] criticism of Congress and various administration branches,” Issa said.

The commission would consist of 10 members; one selected by the president, the rest selected by bipartisan members of House and Senate leadership. Issa said he hoped that the bill would be a bipartisan effort, and said a “dear colleague” letter asking for co-sponsors would be circulated on Thursday to lawmakers on both sides of the aisle.

The presence of Shays and Souder at the afternoon briefing was particularly surprising given that both member face extremely difficult re-election campaigns.

Both have taken beatings from their opponents for casting a vote in support of the so-called bail out bill.

Asked whether he thought it was beneficial to be in Washington, rather than campaigning in Indiana, Souder said, “I don’t know.”

“I thought it was the right thing to do, I cast a tough vote,” he said. “We’ve never had hearings like this right before an election before, so I felt it was my responsibility because I’m one of the senior members of the committee to be here.”

“My district is getting hammered because of these bad decisions [by Wall Street] and I think they want me if I get the opportunity to look at these bond guys and say ‘Raiders, what where you doing? How come my guys are getting laid off because you saw what was happening, and you chose to not report what was happening here’ I’m their voice,” he said.

Souder added, “Now whether anybody actually sees it in the middle of the campaign, whether I get any political bounce I don’t know.”

Shays told The Hill he had returned to Washington for four days but was returning to his Connecticut district on Thursday following the 10 a.m. hearing in the oversight committee.