MSNBC "Countdown With Keith Olbermann" - Transcript

Interview

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Let"s turn now to Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Democrat of Florida, chief deputy whip of the House.

Congresswoman, thanks for your time tonight.

REP. DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ (D), FLORIDA: Thank you, Keith.

OLBERMANN: The president made exactly this argument to Senator Lincoln in answer to her question at the Democratic Senate Caucus meeting yesterday, that Republicans would begin arguing that we start doing what we did before the financial crisis, even though that led straight line, clear bright line to the financial crisis.

Has Congressman Boehner inadvertently proved the president"s point today?

WASSERMAN SCHULTZ: Well, I think what the Republicans have been doing all along is signaling and telegraphing to the American people that the years and years under the Bush administration and their leadership, that there was no one minding the store, is perfectly OK with them. And that we can continue to hang consumers out to dry and that they learned absolutely nothing from the collapse of the financial markets and the financial--the financial services industries.

What Democrats under the president"s leadership are saying is that we need to rein some things in. Not go, you know, all the way to one side and tip the balance, but establish some balance and establish some regulation so that we don"t just leave the industry to their own devices. We saw what happened when we allowed that and it really sent our economy careening off the ledge.

OLBERMANN: I think you"ve just hit on the central point to this. It"s not as if the attempts to reform Wall Street are to shut Wall Street down. It is--as you said--limited and reformational. If Wall Street doesn"t like the populist rhetoric that it has heard from the president in recent weeks, which really was sort of an echo of what the country has been saying for the last few months, wouldn"t they--aren"t they missing their opportunity to get a pretty cut rate, good deal out of all of this?

WASSERMAN SCHULTZ: It makes no sense to me that they wouldn"t come to the table. And, you know, to be honest with you, I think a lot of the Wall Street leadership is willing to come to the table and have been sitting down with the members of the executive branch, as well as our congressional leadership.

It"s the Republicans that seem to really be, you know, off the deep end here. We"ve had literally between 90 percent and 100 percent of the

Republican caucus, Keith, vote against every single proposal that we have -

that we have put out there, whether it"s giving a, say, on pay to shareholders on executive compensation or establishing finally, a consumer financial protection agency or making sure that we don"t allow for the abusive lending that gave so much money to people who really just had no business--no business getting loans and the subprime lending essential scandal that you couldn"t--can"t call it anything else other than that.

Reining those things in is incredibly important to protect consumers and strengthen our economy and Republicans, literally, anywhere between 90 percent to 100 percent of their conference, on each and every one of those votes, have voted no.

OLBERMANN: Your colleague Mr. Frank of Massachusetts, in his capacity as chairman of the financial services committee, told "Huffington Post" today about Mr. Boehner saying he"d made a huge mistake. And the quote was, "In taking credit for the status quo and opposing any kind of reform."

Just politically, how would you go out there and campaign if you were to be identified in these circumstances in this time as the party of dough?

WASSERMAN SCHULTZ: They"re the party of no.

OLBERMANN: Yes.

WASSERMAN SCHULTZ: The party of dough. It"s just unbelievable.

I don"t know how any of those Republicans--my Republican colleagues could stand with a straight face in front of a crowd at a town hall meeting and say that they were--they were OK and comfortable protecting Wall Street. That"s what--that"s what they"re doing.

We"ve got--the American people understand that we got to establish some balance. We have to make sure that we protect consumers. We can"t have banks that are too-big-to-fail anymore. We got legislation to make sure that we can dismantle banks and corporations like AIG when they run into trouble.

We"ve got to make sure that we establish some balance and protect consumers, and protect our economy from financial ruin, which the Bush administration caused and we had to clean up the mess.

OLBERMANN: The chief deputy whip, Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Florida--great thanks for your time, again.

WASSERMAN SCHULTZ: Thank you, Keith.

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