As suspicions about the Federal Reserve become more mainstream, signs of escalating desperation at the Fed become more obvious.
The Fed has announced that its Chairman Ben Bernanke will hold media briefings four times a year.
Bernanke will hold the previously unheard of question-and-answer sessions with reporters following Fed quarterly economic forecast and policy meetings.
The first briefing will take place on April 27 following a regularly scheduled two-day meeting Fed meeting on monetary policy. It will be the first regularly scheduled briefing by a Fed chairman in the history of the central bank. There are also such meetings in June and November of this tear.
"The introduction of regular press briefings is intended to further enhance the clarity and timeliness of the Federal Reserve's monetary policy communication," the central bank said in a statement.
No doubt the Fed will use these briefings to claim that they are bending over backwards to be transparent. Translation: They are scared as hell about a real audit. What are they hiding?
Here's the full press release:
Chairman Ben S. Bernanke will hold press briefings four times per year to present the Federal Open Market Committee's current economic projections and to provide additional context for the FOMC's policy decisions.
In 2011, the Chairman's press briefings will be held at 2:15 p.m. following FOMC decisions scheduled on April 27, June 22 and November 2. The briefings will be broadcast live on the Federal Reserve's website. For these meetings, the FOMC statement is expected to be released at around 12:30 p.m., one hour and forty-five minutes earlier than for other FOMC meetings.
The introduction of regular press briefings is intended to further enhance the clarity and timeliness of the Federal Reserve's monetary policy communication. The Federal Reserve will continue to review its communications practices in the interest of ensuring accountability and increasing public understanding.
I think a good question to ask is if they will bar the reporters who don't play nice with their official nonsense.
ReplyDeleteOf course I needn't say it to the sophisticated crowd that reads EPJ, but we mustn't be fooled by this feigned transparency. Now is the time to further our efforts against this counterfeiter. We're finally getting some traction. Do not let up!
ReplyDeleteIt wonder what Tom Woods is doing on April 27th? Maybe he should consider becoming a member of the press to ask some questions.
Totally agree that they are running scared here. The play is to protect their rears and to calm fears.
ReplyDeleteLast week, Little Matty Yglesias attacked Tom Woods and the Austrians in the first few paragraphs of his article at Democracy Journal.org:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.democracyjournal.org/20/fed-up.php
He wrote:
At one point a speaker [Tom Woods] thundered that Barack Obama and John McCain “both have a lot to learn about Austrian business-cycle theory.” The crowd went delirious with cheers, and soon chants of “end the Fed” echoed throughout the arena.
It was funny at the time. A bunch of cranks talking about their crank monetary theories and espousing a crank prescription.
However, Yglesias never again mentions the ABCT in his article much less attempting a refutation, which, of course, never occurs. But he then asserts:
Most of all, progressives need to start caring about the Fed and engaging in the debate over what it does.
Tom Woods smacked him down here:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/woods/woods166.html
Today, Yglesias is upset with the proposed press conferences of The Ben Bernank:
The Fed announced today that Ben Bernanke is going to start holding regularly scheduled press conferences. I’m open to persuasion, but this seems like a bad idea to me. ******* On some level, though, this is clearly intended as some kind of pushback to the political criticism the Fed’s been getting for the past year. That makes sense, but it underscores the fact that there needs to be a progressive anchor to this debate [READ MY ANTI-TOM WOODS ARTICLE - THE GREATEST EXAMPLE OF PROGRESSIVE ANCHOR!] and not just a circling of the wagons around an institution that has, in fact, failed.
http://yglesias.thinkprogress.org/2011/03/federal-reserve-press-conferences/
This is the example of “pushback” by the “progressives” and their engagement in the debate about what the Fed does. Pitiful.
They have nothing. Ever. It’s over. We have won.