Mitt Romney appeared on CNBC Friday afternoon to trumpet the need for a change in the White House, using the latest dismal jobs report as his rallying cry.
Romney was asked whether the Federal Reserve should engage in a third round of quantitative easing, pumping more liquidity into the economy by printing more money. The presumptive Republican nominee was unequivocally opposed.
"The Fed's stimulative effects have really run their course. QE2 was not able to yield the economic benefit which they had hoped it would be able to yield. And I think that's in part because the president's policies have pretty much consistently all come together to be depressing to the economy, and as a result some of the Fed's stimulative efforts have fallen on hard times. I don't think we're looking for more QE3, if you will. I don't think that will have any more impact than QE2 did.
"I think the right course is to have steadiness from the Fed, to maintain an effort to have strong currency and a predictable currency, and the right course is to get the government, to get the president focused on the issue people really want to see him focus on, which is jobs. Jobs is job one of the president of the United States."
QE2 refers to the Fed's second round of quantitative easing aimed at the sluggish U.S. economy, which took place in late 2010 and the first half of 2011.