I've been reading up on Bush's pick to replace Alan Greenspan at the Fed. From what I've read this morning, Ben Bernanke seems like a sharp guy with real concern for price stability.
There are, of course, some naysayers, but Bernanke is more of a John Roberts than a Harriet Miers.
I would have picked James Glassman, but as long as the new fed chairman is his own man and doesn't react to the media when they start carping that he's no Greenspan, he'll have my support.
OT: Ohhh, vodka, have you seen Nambe's martini shaker for $125?
Sweet.
James "Dow 36,000" Glassman? Are you joking?
Doug:
James "Dow 36,000" Glassman? Are you joking?
It'll get there eventually--it was at 41 in 1932, didn't cross 1000 until 1972, and hit 3000 in 1991. Imagine the incredulous response someone would receive if he titled a book "Dow 3,000" in the 1930s through the '70s--but today, it's 7,000 points higher.
So the Jimmy Carter poster on Bernanke's office wall is nothing to worry about? *g*
I can't wait to hear what the Mogambo Guru http://www.dailyreckoning.com/Writers/MogamboGuru.html has to say, both about Bernanke and about the national debt http://www.publicdebt.treas.gov/opd/opdpenny.htm hitting $8 TRILLION all in the same week.
The Skeptical Optimist:
Why Debt Doomsday is a Myth
...But debt doomsday is a myth. Its fundamental flaw is that it ignores two very important financial mechanisms:
• debt rollover; and
• growing tax receipts in a growing economy.
Walter Wriston, former Chairman of the Citicorp Bank, put debt rollover this way:
If we had a truth-in Government act comparable to the truth-in-advertising law, every note issued by the Treasury would be obliged to include a sentence stating: "This note will be redeemed with the proceeds from an identical note which will be sold to the public when this one comes due."
So here’s the whole truth: Although it’s true that too much debt can be damaging or even disastrous, it’s also true that just the right amount of ever-increasing debt can be, in Alexander Hamilton’s words, “a national blessing.”
How come our politicians never explain that second possible outcome to us? ....
He and Econopundit pose some interesting questions sometimes.
A Fed chairman who thinks inflation comes from high demand?
Yeah, we really need another Keynesian.
