Bernanke confirmation whip count

[natrat]

by: Chris Bowers
Wed Dec 02, 2009 at 17:37

Ben Bernake's current term as chair of the Federal Reserve ends on January 31st, 2010. As such, the Obama administration and Senate are looking to reconfirm him, even though there is no good reason to do so.

The Federal Reserve Act dictates that one of the founding directives of the Federal Reserve is to "promote effectively the goals of maximum employment." However, with a current U3 unemployment rate of 10.2%, it is obvious to everyone in the country that we do not have maximum employment.

The Federal Reserve, under Bernanke, could be taking steps to increase employment. One possible means would be through a program to just start lending money directly to small businesses, such as the one proposed by Senator Mark Warner. However, the Fed hasn't done anything like this, even as it has given over $2,000,000,000,000 in loans to Wall Street financial firms.

This is outrageous, and flies in the face of the Federal Reserves legal mission. Senator Sheldon Whitehouse put it in some colorful terms:

Before voting to confirm Bernanke, Whitehouse told HuffPost he wants to hear "hat they're willing to take their eyes off an exclusive gaze on the welfare of Wall Street and start giving a red hot damn about the American public."

In response to the calls for the Fed to do something about unemployment, Bush-appointed Bernnake has simply thrown his hands up into the air, and claimed that there is nothing he can do. That is simply not true, even if Bernanke thinks that it is.

Even as the country sinks deeper into unemployment, and even Congress prepares a jobs bill that will cost less than one-tenth of the money Bernanke has loaned to Wall Street (loans which he not disclosed the details of), the Senate still appears ready to reconfirm Bernanke as chair of the Federal Reserve. Because he has done such an awesome job of promoting maximum employment, I guess.

Even though some news outlets are reporting that Bernanke has the votes, many of those votes are soft and can potentially be changed if a groundswell of opposition to Bernanke takes root. On that front, the PCCC and the Campaign for America's Future have launched activist efforts to start whipping up opposition. In an interesting trans-partisan alliance, libertarian organizations such as The Campaign for Liberty have joined in. An effort is underway to stop Bernanke, and I encourage you to take part in it.

The start of Bernanke's reconfirmation process is tomorrow, with a hearing in the Senate Banking committee. In preparing for the hearing, in the extended entry I provide a whip count of the 23 Senators on the committee, looking at where each stands on reconfirming Bernanke.


http://www.openleft.com/diary/16290/bernanke-confirmation-whip-count

[mother earth]

1. It's a damned sad state of affairs when Wall St. means more

than Main St. So there's wiggle room for letting unemployment stay the course while inflation's down, you can tell none of them have to worry about it. Guess there's going to be a lot of incumbents leaving office next time around.

The silver spoon needs to be removed, the lifetime benefits need to be axed immediately.
It's like they've got a Marie Antoinette attitude, let them eat cake...of course she was out of office some time later, as I recall of history lessons...