Bernanke, the Fed, and Reform

Frederick Sheehan writes:

Where to open a critique is as much a problem as where to close it. So, this will start and end at the source: the Federal Reserve. In a single sentence, the Journal captured the most compelling reason to heave the proposed legislation into the BP oil spill: “The Federal Reserve would emerge as the pre-eminent regulator, with responsibility for the most complex financial companies.”

The Federal Reserve has less understanding of banking than Bonnie and Clyde. Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke is unable to comprehend there was cause-and-effect between the boom the 1920s and the Great Depression of the 1930s. His ineptitude gave then-Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan the academic cover to reduce the fed funds rate to one percent in 2003. The most egregious credit bubble in the history of the world followed. Learning nothing, Simple Ben has now cut the funds rate to zero, creating an even greater credit bubble than the behemoth that collapsed in 2007.

Bernanke and his cohorts have no excuse for their ignorance...

It is too late to escape the consequences of what Greenspan and Bernanke have done. But, there is no excuse for allowing the ruin to continue inflating. Chairman Bernanke keeps adding fuel to the conflagration. He should be handed a one-way ticket on a coal car to Princeton this afternoon.

read the entire essay