Bernanke chides Occupy Wall Street 'misconceptions'

CNN ^ | November 3, 2011 | Annalyn Censky

[LesDowrey]

America's top central banker "sympathizes" with the Occupy Wall Street protesters and thinks many of their frustrations with the sluggish economy are "understandable." But there's one complaint Ben Bernanke does take issue with: the backlash against the Federal Reserve. "I think that the concerns about the Fed are based on misconceptions"

The Occupy Wall Street protests, which started in New York in September and have since spread around the world, are known for their ever-evolving and diverse list of grievances. Among them are the common themes of distaste for the banking system and frustration with government.

With that in mind, the Fed is perfectly situated as a whipping boy for the Occupy demonstrations. The Fed was created by and reports to Congress. Its top leaders are appointed by the president. Yet, the Fed is independently funded and works as a bank, too, serving both private and foreign institutions as well as the U.S. government. Bridging all those roles, the Fed played the central role in facilitating the government's 2008 Wall Street bailout -- which is still not popular despite that fact that it eventually turned a profit for taxpayers.

"The Federal Reserve was involved, obviously, in trying to stabilize the financial system in 2008 and 2009," Bernanke said, in response to a question about the protests from CNNMoney.

"A very simplistic interpretation of that was that we were doing that because we wanted to preserve, you know, banker salaries. That is obviously not the case."

"What we were doing was trying to protect the financial system in order to prevent a serious collapse of both the financial system and the American economy," he added. "Not everybody understands that, and therefore they sometimes misunderstand our motives. Our motives are strictly to do what's in the interest of the broad public."

[LesDowrey]

I don't know who I dislike more...Ben Bernanke or the Occupy Wall Street Protestors.

If only we had thought to include Ben Bernanke in the latest episode of the Les Dowrey Show. Ben vs. the OWS Zombies. If you haven't seen the latest episode of the show, you can Watch It Here!

[wolfman23601]

Bernanke is far worst than the OWS protestors. Bernanke actually has power.

[BitWielder1]

Translation: It's everybody else's fault, not mine.

[DJ MacWoW]

Wake Up And Donate!

Click The Pic

Let's Make The Bar Yellow!

[throwback]

The dispute between Bernanke and OWS is that Bernanke is only in favor of socializing the losses, but OWS wants the gains as well. We in the stupid minority want neither.