"Fed chief awaits key Senate vote on confirmation": Yahoo!

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  1. fishskinfreak2008 profile image58
    fishskinfreak2008posted 14 years ago

    http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Fed-chief … 0&.v=7

    So what are lawmakers saying about this? According to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, "I think (that) the chairman is going to be confirmed ON A BI-PARTISAN VOTE". WHAT DO REPUBLICANS KNOW ABOUT BI-PARTISANSHIP?

    According to Vermont independent Sen. Bernie Sanders, "HE WAS ASLEEP AT THE WHEEL while Wall Street became A GAMBLING CASINO". That's a drastic charge.

    This reinforces the fact that even government employees are not safe in this market/environment.

    1. profile image0
      A Texanposted 14 years agoin reply to this

      "WHAT DO REPUBLICANS KNOW ABOUT BI-PARTISANSHIP?" A hell of a lot more than Democrats!

      1. Ron Montgomery profile image60
        Ron Montgomeryposted 14 years agoin reply to this

        Contrary to what you are thinking, it involves more than just occassionally switching to your left hand.

        1. profile image0
          A Texanposted 14 years agoin reply to this

          Fine job Ron.

  2. Wayne Orvisburg profile image62
    Wayne Orvisburgposted 14 years ago

    Just remember to contact your Congressman and Senator to vote for the bill to audit the Fed!

  3. Ralph Deeds profile image69
    Ralph Deedsposted 14 years ago

    Bernanke will be confirmed. He isn't perfect, but he deserves to be reappointed. It's in the national interest for the Fed to retain its independence from the Congress and the President.

    Bernanke was confirmed today by a 70-30 vote. Here's why--


    By ALAN S. BLINDER
    Published: January 27, 2010

    Princeton, N.J.

    Room for DebateIs Ben Bernanke to blame for the weak recovery and high unemployment numbers?
    Join the Discussion »

    A SENATE vote on President Obama’s nomination of Ben Bernanke for a second four-year term as chairman of the Federal Reserve is imminent. Rejecting him would be a big mistake, for it would both flog a distinguished public servant who helped avert catastrophe and turn the Fed chairmanship into yet another political football. Washington has plenty of political footballs already.

    The case for Ben Bernanke starts with his keen intellect. But perhaps more important in these trying times, he has demonstrated great creativity. He has also displayed the courage to put his head on the chopping block for policies he thinks right. And he is now battle-tested. (Disclosure: I am a long-time friend and former academic colleague of Mr. Bernanke.)

    Critics frequently point out that Mr. Bernanke has not always made the right calls. It’s a fair complaint, but who has always been right? Yes, he initially allowed the Fed to continue the regulatory laxity bequeathed him by Alan Greenspan. No, he did not foresee the full depth of the impending financial implosion. But who did? And, in my view, he and Henry Paulson, then the Treasury secretary, made an egregious error by letting Lehman Brothers collapse. (On the other hand, there were no good options.)

    But his job performance since, say, October 2008 has been superlative. To cite just a few examples, Mr. Bernanke led the Fed to lower its interest rates to virtually zero in December 2008 and then to hold them there. The central bank also invented approaches to lending and purchasing assets that breathed some life into moribund markets like commercial paper and mortgage-backed securities. It led the highly successful “stress tests” of 19 large financial institutions last spring.

    The success of these policies is demonstrable. The simplest and most objective measures of financial distress are the differences, or “spreads,” between various (risky) interest rates and the corresponding (risk-free) Treasury rates. During the worst of the crisis, in September to November 2008 and again in February to March 2009, these spreads skyrocketed to dizzying heights. Since then, they have fallen remarkably, providing direct evidence that the Fed’s cure is working.

    Success in righting the “real” economy has naturally been slower; financial markets always move much faster than gross domestic product, incomes and jobs. But it’s palpable nonetheless. The economy was nearly in free fall during the last quarter of 2008 and the first quarter of 2009, dropping by 5.4 percent and 6.4 percent in real terms, respectively.

    Then the moves by the Fed and the Obama administration took hold: G.D.P. barely declined in the second quarter of 2009; and by the third quarter it began to rise. As this was happening, the job loss rate, which was staggering last winter, fell by more than three-quarters. On Friday we will get the initial estimate of fourth-quarter G.D.P. growth, which analysts expect to top 5 percent. And there is a good chance that job growth is about to resume.

    This rapid improvement came faster than almost anyone expected. The plain truth is that, as bad as the recession was, it turned out to be less horrific than expected, and Ben Bernanke is one of the reasons. Unfortunately, “it could have been much worse” doesn’t buy you much in politics.

    Finally, senators should think of the institution instead of the man. The Federal Reserve System is one of the great legacies of the Progressive Era. The Fed is not flawless and has made its share of errors over the years. But since the 1950s, it has developed a well-deserved reputation for competence, integrity and, above all, nonpolitical decision-making in what may be the world’s most political town.

    The Fed does not do Congress’s bidding, nor the president’s. When necessary, it can and does take politically unpopular actions. It can move quickly and decisively in emergencies. If the Fed’s political independence is compromised, the nation will lose something valuable.

    There are several threats to that independence right now. But perhaps none is as potentially damaging as turning the nomination of the Fed chairman into a political circus. Doing so would be a sharp break with history, for Fed nominations have not been partisan affairs. Jimmy Carter put Paul Volcker in office, and Ronald Reagan re-nominated him. Mr. Reagan’s choice, Alan Greenspan, replaced Mr. Volcker and was retained by the next three administrations. Mr. Obama now proposes to keep in office a Republican chosen by George W. Bush.

    None of these nominations were politically contentious — until now. No nominee for Fed chairman has ever been rejected by the Senate. Even no votes are relatively rare. In fact, the nominee who received the most negative votes in history was Paul Volcker, who won re-confirmation in 1983 by an 84-16 margin. Yet, in the eyes of many, Mr. Volcker was the greatest Fed chairman ever. Those 16 senators look pretty foolish in the eyes of history. There may be a lesson there.

    Alan S. Blinder, a professor of economics at Princeton, was vice chairman of the Federal Reserve from 1994 to 1996.

  4. Ralph Deeds profile image69
    Ralph Deedsposted 14 years ago

    Bernanke was confirmed for another 4-year term as Fed Chairman by a 70-30 vote of the Senate this afternoon.

    Eleven Democrats, one independent and 18 Republicans including John McCain, Richard Shelby and Jim Bunning voted against confirming Bernanke. Senate minority leader McCcnnell voted to confirm as did Democratic majority leader Harry Reid.

  5. MikeNV profile image67
    MikeNVposted 14 years ago

    The only big Mistake is the Federal Reserve System itself.

    Bernanke is a criminal. The Fed is full of criminals so anyone they appoint will just be another criminal.

    Complete and total control of the money supply is in the hands of private bankers. The Bankers own YOU!

    The Fed creates growth and recession by manipulating the money supply and creating more and more debt.  It's all artificial.  Our entire money supply is artificial.  The Fed and Commercial Banks are allowed to create money from nothing.  They then loan out this pretend currency.  Next the market is flooded with more paper currency creating more inflation.  Prices rise. People must borrow more to live.

    The Private Bankers are guaranteed by law a 6% return for doing nothing more than printing money.

    Debt is not infinitely sustainable.  The very system itself is collapsed and efforts to revive it with more borrowing and spending will fail.

    The Crash is coming... and it will make the Great Depression look like a recession.  This is not doom and gloom this is fact. The numbers are already in place, the debt is NOT sustainable.  Americans can not even pay the interest on the debt let along make any kind of inroads into the principal due.

    And who do we owe?  We owe the Bankers.  The system is designed to transfer private property to the Bankers.

    The Average American has no idea what the Federal Reserve is... how it operates, or who owns it.

    Banks and Bankers are taking ownership of private property as more and more foreclosures occur.  The commercial real estate market foreclosures are just not starting to escalate.

    The Federal Reserve is NOT a Republican nor a Democrat issue.  The Private Bankers own both sides.

    Case in Point:  Obama attended a Secret meeting with the Bilderberg Group, so did Hilary and Bill Clinton, so did Texas Governor Rick Perry.  Bankers tell Politicians what to do.

 
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