Mr. Bernanke goes to Washington, and has my Sympathies

Our Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke is up for another term. President Obama has reappointed him but Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) has placed a hold on the appointment and now Mr. Bernanke has to go before the Senate Finance Committee. Now I have said before that I am not a big fan of Mr. Bernanke and feel he shares a major part of the responsibility for the economic crisis. I also have said that in my opinion the only thing worse than the FED as currently constituted making the economic policy decisions would be if the congress gets involved in making them. But that is not what I wish to focus on in this post.

What I wish to focus on is the quality, or lack therof, of the questions posed to Mr. Bernanke, and the comments directed at him by our elected representatives, it applies to all the testimony before the various congressional committees by the players in this economic debacle.

I think the Senate committee is somewhat better than the House's but by no means did anyone on either side of the aisle impress me or come even close to making me proud. Inane questions, pompous posturing, and partisan antics are the rule and intelligent questions are posed about as often as the appearance of Halleys Comet. Mr. Bernanke's three main antagonists are politically in very different camps, Mr. Paul a libertarian, the afforementioned Mr. Sanders an independent who leans to socialist, and arch republican Mr. Bunning. All three of these men have pilloried Mr. Bernanke for his role in the crisis and the subsequent policies that have been employed by him in the attempt at recovery. A recovery that still remains to be played out. Mr. Sanders and Mr Paul have asked questions and made statements that indicate a shallow understanding of the matter at best, and Mr. Bunning has done them one better with a vitriolic display of testosterone reminiscent of the display of a silverback gorilla in full bluff. Angry and frothing he attacked Mr. Bernanke in a manner better reserved for Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. Mr. Bernanke took the abuse with his typical calmness, but his voice betrayed a man fighting for his job while the arbitrators of that decision do not understand the nuance nor the depth of that which they are charged with. If Mr. Bunning had directed his attack at me, I would have rushed the bench and beat him to a pulp with his microphone and resigned as I was doing it. And I would do whatever jail time I was given with a smile on my face knowing justice was done.

I am a serious wonk when it comes to all matters of the economy. I have watched just about all the testimony of the players in this mess, from Henry Paulson to Stan O'neill, Ken Lewis to the airline CEO's. I recorded one of Mr. Geithners house testimonies onto my iPod so I could watch it on a flight later that day. The one constant in all these things was the astonishing, embarrassing, and in many cases outright wackiness of our elected officials. Whether it was Mr. Bernanke being asked about his time at Goldman Sachs by Maxine Waters, or Michelle Bachmans meandering disjointed query so bewildering a clearly puzzled Mr. Geithner had to ask her what she meant. I would have quit on the spot and told them both what idiots I thought they were, and what an insult to the national intelligence they are.

On many occasions during these episodes of comic theater I actually found myself rooting for the likes of Angelo Mozillo and John Thain!!!!! Two guys I would absolutely push into traffic to save my cat, and I felt sorry that they had to put up with these dolts. If it wasn't a national tragedy it would be funny. Today, I felt sorry for Mr. Bernanke. No matter what your opinion of his competence, it is very hard to make the case that he is unethical or not well meaning. He is a man of scholarship and has probably done his best and sweated over many of his decisions. I wouldn't take his job for any amount of money, and he no doubt gets paid a tenth of what he would command in the private sector.

Mr. Bernanke is likely to be confirmed even in the face of his detractors, and I am OK with that, if only because a man of his stature should not be fired by the likes of these alleged servants of the public trust. If the president were to remove him next week in private after his confirmation that would be fine as well.


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