first of all, our attorney general eric holder, secretary of housing and urban development shean donovane attorney general and former classmate of mine tom pirelli. we've got attorney general george jettison from connecticut, roy cooper attorney general from north carolina. lisa madigan from my home state of illinois and former seat mate of mine in the state legislature together. dustin mcdaniel from arkansas. gregory zeller from indiana and tom miller from iowa. i also want to acknowledge bob ryan who worked with with shean donovan extensively on this issue as well as tim masiff of treasury and gene sperling who doesn't always get the credit he deserves for doing outstanding work. the housing bubble that burst nearly six years ago triggered, as we all know, the worst economic crisis of our lifetimes. it costs millions of innocent americans their jobs and their homes. it remains one of the biggest drags on our economy. last fall my administration unveiled a series of steps to help responsible homeowners refinance their mortgages to ache advantage of historically low rates. last week i ur

secretary of housing and urban development shean donovan.te attorney general and former classmate of mine tom pe relly. we have got attorney general george jeffman from connecticut. roy cooper, attorney general from north carolina. lisa madigan from my home state of illinois. and former seat mate of mine when we were in the state legislature together. dustin mcdaniel from arkansas. gregory zoeller from indiana. and tom miller from iowa. and i also want to acknowledge bob ryan, who worked with shean donovan extensively on this issue, as well as tim mathis of treasury. and i'm going to acknowledge also jean sperling, who doesn't always get the credit he deserves for doing outstanding work. >>> the housing bubble that bust nearly six years ago triggered as we all know the worst economic crisis of our lifetimes. it cost millions of innocent americans their jobs. and their homes. and it remains one of the biggest drags on our economy. last fall, my administration unveiled a series of steps to help responsible homeowners refinance their mortgages

and the president's housing secretary shean donovan said today this will mean giving the average familyks if they are able to refinance with these low rates right now and that money will go right back into the economy. take a listen. >> we're not going to sit on our hands watching middle class homeowners who have done the right thing and played by the rules, get hurt. >> now, they are facing an uphill battle on the capitol hill though for many reasons, including the fact that republics say if you get the fha even more involved in backing these loans at a time when the fha is into their reserves and there is talk about a potential bailout for the fha this could be a bad idea. >> shepard: this has to get through congress and the republicans are like, stop it, you know? >> yes. and they're against the fact that the president has a price tag of nearly $10 billion for this plan and wants to pay for it with a new tax on big banks. republicans say they are opposed to that. and the white house though is upset that mitt romney was in las vegas in october and said you have to stop tinkering aroun