Bi-partisan bill to Audit the Fed (S. 604)

[JMeganSnow]

One of my online friends was telling me today about S. 604, the Federal Reserve Sunshine Act, which is supposedly a bit of positive legislation for the purposes of holding an audit of the Federal Reserve. Personally, I'm not so sure this is a good idea. What is accomplished by making a rights-violating entity more efficient? The only thing this bill really seems to do is to enable the Comptroller General to audit any bank in the U.S. at will instead of having to get permission from the Federal Reserve first.

I am confused. What is the point of this legislation?

[2046]

They way they see it, the point is if they can Audit the Fed to see what they are doing, it will be the first step in getting it abolished.

...legislation is aimed at pulling back the curtain from a secretive and unaccountable Federal Reserve. Congress and the American people have minimal, if any, oversight over trillions of dollars that the Fed controls.

With recent bailouts and spending decisions shining a spotlight on the actions of the Federal Reserve, more and more pressure is bearing down on Congress to take action and demand accountability and transparency.

Auditing the Fed is only the first step towards exposing this antiquated insider-run creature to the powerful forces of free-market competition. Once there are viable alternatives to the monopolistic fiat dollar, the Federal Reserve will have to become honest and transparent if it wants to remain in business.

[softwareNerd]

They way they see it, the point is if they can Audit the Fed to see what they are doing, it will be the first step in getting it abolished.

This is not likely though. All it might accomplish is to increase Congressional control over the Fed, making it more responsive to democratic mood swings. That's a step in the wrong direction.

[JMeganSnow]

This is not likely though. All it might accomplish is to increase Congressional control over the Fed, making it more responsive to democratic mood swings. That's a step in the wrong direction.

This is precisely what I was thinking. If people actually want to abolish anything, they look around for methods of dismantling it. They don't try to *fix* it first. No one is going to put $3000 into a car right before they take it to the junkyard.

[Greebo]

*** Mod's note: Merged with an earlier topic. - sN ***

It's said that the Democrats are the Evil Party, and the Republicans the Stupid party, and so anything they both agree upon is both Stupid, and Evil. (If you are offended, please feel free to reverse your party name with the adjective applied...)

But in this case, although it's a far cry from ABOLITION of the FED, PERHAPS, JUST PERHAPS this is a move that is actually a GOOD IDEA!

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33021463/ns/bu...ks_and_economy/

WASHINGTON - House lawmakers want to pry open the books of the famously secretive Federal Reserve with legislation that would subject the U.S. central bank to a sweeping congressional audit.

The effort is overwhelmingly bipartisan. Hardline conservatives and liberal Democrats have banded together in their criticism of the Federal Reserve as a major power broker in the financial system that does not answer to Congress.

OF course, I may be simply deluding myself...

Edited September 25, 2009 by softwareNerd
Merged

[D'kian]

OF course, I may be simply deluding myself...

I think a more likely result will be a law to give Congress power over the Fed. The Fed is bad enough, but at least it has been run by economists. Let it be run by Congressional fad and whim, and we'll find out how much more worse things can be.

Just a thought.

[brian0918]

Here's a clip posted today of a Representative questioning a Fed lawyer about whether they manipulate the stock market:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1h2c3Hkf7

Edited September 25, 2009 by brian0918

[Andrew Grathwohl]

S. 604 is actually a bill replicating Congressman Ron Paul's bill, HR.1207. The House is currently conducting hearings on HR.1207 and could go to a vote any day now. The idea of the bill is to have a complete audit of the Federal Reserve, without changing any regulation or secrecy of the Federal Reserve Bank's monetary policy decisions.

[Greebo]

Here's a clip posted today of a Representative questioning a Fed lawyer about whether they manipulate the stock market:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1h2c3Hkf7

Bad link

[brian0918]

Damn!

Good watch, don't miss it.

Edited September 26, 2009 by brian0918

[softwareNerd]

Damn!

Good watch, don't miss it.

What did you like about it? That Grayson guy is talking like a conspiracy theorist libertarian, and being unnecessarily argumentative trying to make some play-to-the-gallery point rather than trying to find the truth. All he can come up with are hypothetical notions, with no basis in fact. Never does he try to really figure out what is really going on, and what control processes are currently in place. Edited September 26, 2009 by softwareNerd

[IchorFigure]

It seems the bill to audit the Fed advanced today.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1109/29734.html

[Alone]

This is precisely what I was thinking. If people actually want to abolish anything, they look around for methods of dismantling it. They don't try to *fix* it first. No one is going to put $3000 into a car right before they take it to the junkyard.

The point of "fixing it" (obviously) is to expose just how broken it is, not to really fix it.

Its strategically a good move, because without a lot of bad publicity the FED isn't going anywhere any time soon.

You see, the machinations of the FED are not common knowledge.

Most people have no idea what the FED is or why it is there, or how it operates. They vaguely classify it as some kind of bank or an arm of the US Treasury. They could tell you that it has something to do with economics, but they couldn't tell you much else.

The car analogy isn't correct.

For that analogy to work the car would need to be breaking down, and the people riding in it would need to be ignorantly blaming a "good working engine" (capitalism) for making the car break down. When its plainly obvious that the car doesn't have a good working engine, but the people in the car just won't raise the hood to find a baseless FIAT printing press engine breaking them down.

[softwareNerd]

The point of "fixing it" (obviously) is to expose just how broken it is, not to really fix it.

Those who matter already have an opinion about the Fed. The rest do not matter because something like this is going to be ignored -- at best a month or two later. So, the long term effect of this will be that the Fed will still exist and will be slightly more subservient to populism coming via Congress. In other words, this bill will make things worse.

I am not at all surprised that Ron Paul will help make things worse.