mr. chambliss: mr.president what's the current business before the senate? the presiding officer: the crapo amendment to the landrieu amendment is the pending question. mr. chambliss: i would ask unanimous consent that the pending amendment be set aside and that i be allowed to call up my amendment numbered 3816. the presiding officer: is there objection? mr. dodd: reserving the right to object and i won't object at all. i have chatted with my friend, senator chambliss as well. i know he is going -- he is inquiring among his members as is my colleague from arkansas as well about a time agreement on the chambliss amendment. my hope would be that it wouldn't take too long. i know that's the plea of every manager, majority, minority leader. if they can inquire as soon as possible on time. there are several other amendments tonight. i think mr. president we'll be able to deal with, some of which won't require any roll call votes at all. but obviously members like to get some sense of when votes will occur.

mr. chambliss: mr. president, coil to the floor this morning to talk about -- i come to the floor this morning to talk about the current pending business before this body. this is an issue which obviously raised its ugly head a couple of years ago with the financial meltdown that occurred in this country, and i think all of us in this body agree that it's imperative that the senate take action to try to make sure that what happened to the financial industry in th in america nevers the opportunity to happen again. and i would commend senator dodd, senator shelby for their work on this bill. we've had our disagreements, but yet we have ehad significant agreement on some -- but yet we've had significant agreement on some areas. we're now trying to take the base bill and make that bill a bill that all of us in this body hopefully will wind up being able to support because we've improved the bill to the point where it really addresses the root cause of the problem that arose during 2007, 2008 and on into 200

mr. chambliss: mr. president, first of all, let me extend the same courtesy to my chairman. she is a dear friend. we work closely together on virtually every issue. it is unusual for us to disagree on any major issue. but she and her staff have been great to work with, always, they've been very open and we've had an open dialogue, we just simply disagree about the way that this issue needs to be -- needs to be dealt with. and let the me just say that an indication of how complex this issue is and why this issue is so important and why we don't need to have our -- our constituents expend money when they don't need to expend money that's going to be passed on to consumers of every single product virtually that's made in america, is this: there are a lot of people who have gotten up here on the other side and have spoken about this -- this amendment. and i know they don't intend to get up here and make statements that aren't correct. but, frankly, that's what we heard. and all i can attribute that to is the fact that this is such a complex issue that the folks who have been spe

mr. chambliss: mr. president, first of all, i thank the chairman for allowing us to debate this amendment this afternoon. this is one of the most critical amendments that i think that certainly we have talked about today and moving forward, unless we address the issue of the g.o.c.'s as i'm going to talk about in a minute, i'm not sure we have accomplished anything in this bill. for all the potential unintended consequences in this financial regulatory restructuring package, at least one will be entirely intentional, and that is the failure to address freddie mac and fannie mae. despite the general theme of the increased overreaching regulatory power of this legislation, a glaring example of something that was actually left out is a substantive attempt to address one of the most significant causes of the financial crisis, and that is reform of the government-sponsored enterprises or g.s.e.'s such as freddie mac and fannie mae. it hoob highlight interested this floor that recent market volatility and a f

when we get into the derivative section, we'll have senators lincoln and chambliss will be managing that part of the legislation. mrst night federal and local officials in new york city apprehended the man they believe to have attempted a terrorist attack in times square on saturday. i want to join all americans in thank the law enforcement officials who worked around the clock these past two days. it looks like they got their man. and we're grateful for their efforts on our behalf. it is my understanding that the suspect, a naturalized american citizen, is a native of pakistan and that he traveled there at some point in the past year. hopefully the appropriate officials are using this opportunity to exploit as much intelligence as he may have about his overseas connections and any other plots against americans, either here or abroad. but this is very good news, and again we want to thank those who worked so hard to keep us safe and to protect us from ongoing threats. as i said yesterday, this plot is a reminder to all of us that the need for constant vigilance can never, never be dropped. i'd also like to say a wo