Bernanke Appears Before Senate Banking Committee (VIDEO)

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke faces questions from the Senate Banking Committee Tuesday.

His testimony comes a day after the government moved closer to dramatically expanding its ownership stakes in the nation's banks, including Citigroup Inc. The Treasury Department, the Fed and other banking regulators said Monday they could convert the government's stock in the banks from preferred shares to common shares.

The event is expected to begin at 10 AM Eastern Time. Watch here:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Comments

[sixx]

07:53 PM on 02/24/2009

To paraphrase my favorite fabricator Condi Rice,
"Who could have known...?"

Who could have known that unregulated speculation and trickle down would destroy the economy.......? ..........................MILLIONS.

[PhilipTaylor]

07:17 PM on 02/24/2009

YES and we must remember that the FED and its owners think in decades and some in FED think in centuries so the FED may be willing to change for a year or even a term but will always gravitate back to what is good for the ELITE. We Americans must begin to think both in the short term and long term or we will find ourselves repeatedly "Harvested" like a crop of corn.

Congress has the legal authority to shut down the Federal Reserve. Government has the authority to issue money without paying interest to the bankers. This will take away the power to control our government from bankers!

In the words of Thomas Jefferson...."If the American people allow the banks to control the issuance of their currency, the banks and corporations will grow up around them and will deprive the people of all property, until their children wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered!"

We must remember the misconduct that Greenspan followed, using interest rates and credit flows to influence elections, to cause Booms and Busts, and to manipulate markets. All in the name of serving Americans by smoothing out the Markets and the Economy!

So it is time to either restructure the FED to be friendly to Americans in general or to pass strict laws that prevent the kind of misuse of monetary policy to "HARVEST" American's Retirement Plans or to "HARVEST" Booms and Busts for the benefit of the pre-informed ELITES!

[RTIII]

01:18 PM on 02/24/2009

Anybody notice how Bernake praised going off the Gold standard? This is one of our most fundamental problems!
.

[NOLIESPLEASE]

01:14 PM on 02/24/2009

Lies lies lies....just more lies lies lies ....just more lies lies lies!!!!

Why don't you ask Mr. Bernakee .... Why should the United States borrow money from itself at interest????

Why does every other nation in this world borrow from itself without INTEREST?????

How much have the shareholders of the Federal Reserve made in profits in 2008???

Why should the american public be put into dept because we borrow from ourselves at interest?????

ANSWER THESE QUESTIONS MR. BERNACKEE!!!!

[RTIII]

01:17 PM on 02/24/2009

Yes. The most key bank we need to _permanently_ nationalize is the Federal Reserve (which is neither Federal - it's private - nor does it manage any reserves - it creates fiat money).
.

[BushBites]

01:18 PM on 02/24/2009

Ron Paul '12!

[BushBites]

01:12 PM on 02/24/2009

More investors would invest in banks if more banks failed.

Hillbilly economics.

[Redeemer777]

01:10 PM on 02/24/2009

Oh my, its American citizen Shelby

[RTIII]

01:07 PM on 02/24/2009

"Public / private partnership" = "Let the public continue to dump capital into dead banks, potentially forever, because the mechanism proposed can't ever truly resolve the bad books because there are no buyers therefor."
.

[RTIII]

01:04 PM on 02/24/2009

"Substantial franchise value" = "their names are valuable and the public should take it on the chin to save their names" ... which also = "leave the same heads of these banks in power throughout and let the public pick up the tab for their failures."

Harumph.
.

[RJII]

01:01 PM on 02/24/2009

I want to believe this MF'er soo bad. I'm hurting. I try to keep an optimistic mind.

[RTIII]

12:46 PM on 02/24/2009

Shelby asked GREAT questions.

One had to do with nationalization. Bernake's answer was: we don't need no stinkin' nationalization!

-ugh-
.

[qdog112]

12:52 PM on 02/24/2009

Do your homework. Do you know what Shelby's role was in the creation of this mess?

He was in charge of banking.

[RTIII]

01:09 PM on 02/24/2009

OK, I don't know a thing about him - except that he's the leading R on this committee. However, he _did_ ask vastly better questions than the idio.t before him.
.

[RJII]

12:43 PM on 02/24/2009

Shelby...one of our biggest a$$clowns in Congress at the mic right now.

[RTIII]

12:55 PM on 02/24/2009

Maybe but he asked way better questions than the Senator who preceded him.

[magibrotherhood]

02:09 PM on 02/24/2009

Shelby has been on the Senate banking committee for YEARS------where was this dofuss when the derivatives etc. were flooding the mortgage system????

[aBr1t]

01:29 PM on 02/24/2009

Ahhh yes my fav word

HES AN A$$CLOWN and HE STATED CLEAR AS DAY THE US GOVERMENT PAYS INTREST ON THE MONEY THE FED PRINTS FROM THIN AIR

THE PROBLEM IS THE FED.. WAKE UP

[strangerinthenight]

12:38 PM on 02/24/2009

That testimony is a coincedence - before the President's speech tonight. Obvioulsy President Obama wants artificial gain, so there you go - Bernanke's speech, after which after close scrutiny by the public and the business community, that artificial gain from 129 now down to 36.

If the President wants to be receive well, he ought to send someone with impeccable credibility. Absence that, businees and the voting public will not respond well. Negative confidence by the market.

Build me up just to let me down. We know the drill.

[mcfried]

12:21 PM on 02/24/2009

Someone please drug test the man... his projections are so optimistic he must be on something.

[jillsond]

12:02 PM on 02/24/2009

He reminds me of an 8 year old trying to explain away a mischievous act.

[AngieMom57]

12:48 PM on 02/24/2009

lol, right on!

[jd16]

11:48 AM on 02/24/2009

It's amazing how many economists that know so much about our current situation post on this forum. Why aren't you all in Washington helping our law-makers find the right solution to this problem? Perhaps, you should go in front of the Senate Banking Committee so you can show the world how smart you are and how much you know about macroeconomics.

[AngieMom57]

11:57 AM on 02/24/2009

I humbly disagree with you. Voicing an opinion on this post is educational at best, humorous at worst and a ray of genius just might come from our keyboard economists.