Alan Grayson: "Which Foreigners Got the Fed's $500,000,000,000?" Bernanke: "I Don't Know."

[FLAprogressive]

Run time: 05:12 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0NYBTkE1yQ   Posted on YouTube: July 21, 2009 By YouTube Member: Views on YouTube: 0   Posted on DU: July 21, 2009 By DU Member: FLAprogressive Views on DU: 1878

 
audit the fed now!!!

[Schema Thing]

1. your headline is misleading

the fed may indeed need auditing, but not because of your fake "gotcha".

[girl gone mad]

4. Did you even watch Bernanke's testimony?

Bernanke couldn’t say which financial institutions got half a Trillion of the Fed's money. Bernanke doesn't seem to understand why the dollar rose 30% at the same time as the Federal Reserve lent out $500B to foreign central banks (he thinks it was just a coincidence). Bernanke doesn't seem to know that bilateral private transactions between the Fed and foreign central banks are unconstitutional. It's way past time to audit the Fed.

[jacksmind]

15. Bernanke did fine

Who cares if he couldn't name the institutions, he didn't even recommend this transaction. And there are thousands of variables that effect the value of the dollar. You know what else went up during that time? The temperature in Cleveland. OOoooh the fed must be controlling the weather! What's the correlation coefficient between foreign loans and the value of the dollar? What's the error on it? What, you don't know? Then how do you know there's this wasn't a coincidence?

People have a hard time creating a consistent picture. The fed goes to congress for the power to do the bailouts, but now they break the law, that seems odd. We all know that Ron Paul hates it because he has his Austrian/Libertarian ideas and doesn't really understand how the economy works (did either him or Peter Shiff get a degree in Economics?). And in the meantime almost no professional economist on the IDEAS rankings is arguing for auditing the fed (250+ are petitioning against it) (could there be a reason besides the one you believe in? is it even *possible*?), and most certainly NONE --read that again: NONE--NONE out of 1000 of the top economists are saying get rid of it. (Hmm I wonder what the libertarian Milton Freedman said about it? Hint: he was a Monetarist) And in the meantime 190 countries around the world all have central banks.

Fine. Let's do the audit so we can have people understand why the fed is an independent institution why it *seems* so secretive , and why they do the things they do (Hint: read wikipedia). Let's nail down the constitutionality of what they do, and even if we revoke some of their powers, watch the economy struggle and then the fed can go to congress to get these powers reinstated. Let's get this over with so all I have to deal with are the birthers, 911 truthers, global warming denialists, and moon landing deniers.

[shaayecanaan]

16. It doesnt matter...

The swap (not really a loan) was made with the European central banks. What they then do with the money is up to them. In exchange, the US Fed received Euros which it could then lend or dispose of as it saw fit. Again, its not for the European central banks to say to whom those Euros should be lent.

Theoretically, a large swap such as this should have the same market effect as a large group of buyers buying euros with dollars at the rate of the swap - ie, it should have the effect of stabilising the exchange rate.

It should be noted that the spike in the dollar was not as large as the spike in the yen, which went through a similar period of strong deleveraging that created a demand for those currencies. So as a measure it was probably modestly successful.

Basically, this is what a Reserve Bank is there to do - sell or swap currencies when they are overbought and buy when they are oversold.

[FLAprogressive]

6. *my* fake gotcha? Misleading headline???

I took the headline straight from the video.....

[Jim Sagle]

12. Take yer fake indignation back to the DLC.

[ProfessorPlum]

2. Holy crap, that was weak on Bernanke's part.

At least come loaded with some facts, dude.

[PatSeg]

3. He looked very uncomfortable

He probably had facts, that he couldn't or wouldn't share.

[FLAprogressive]

10. he's a very slimy indvidual

[Not Me]

5. He's my congressman!

And a huge improvement over his predecessor Ric Keller R-Asswipe.

[Reform]

8. Lucky you

Please try to keep him there or help advance him.
Enough with voting in these fake politicians who would sell there own mother out to step ahead in this game of power and greed.
We need more honest men and women out there.

[FLAprogressive]

9. he'd be a great senator from FL. Would love to see him primary Nelson in 2012.

[mascarax]

11. That would be great!

I'll donate too (again!) - am a big Grayson fan.

[democracy1st]

13. very impressed,now thats how you conduct a interview,discussion etc

[Grinchie]

7. Pretty good way to show why the Federal Reserve is killing us.

Clear manipulation, fully exposed, neatly filleted, and presented for world consumption.

Bernanke, a great poker player to the end, grins and say, "So?".

[JDPriestly]

14. Grinchie, you said it very well.