Knowledge Creates Power: Ben Bernanke, Time magazine's 'Person of the Year'

Thursday, December 17, 2009

Ben Bernanke, Time magazine's 'Person of the Year'

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, a student of the Great Depression who has fought to avert another one, is Time Magazine's "person of the year.”

It was Bernanke and then-Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson who were said to have sucked the oxygen from a room filled with congressional leaders on Capitol Hill when they met last year to explain the gravity of the credit crisis that was unfolding.

Bernanke has since won another term as Federal Reserve chairman, reappointed by President Obama. And now he's won a Time cover.

Time chose Bernanke over House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Gen. Stanley McChyrstal, "the Chinese worker'' and many more.

"We came very, very close to a depression,'' Bernanke tells Time. "The markets were in anaphylactic shock. I'm not happy with where we are, but it's a lot better than where we could be. ... Of course, there were things we could have done better, but this was a perfect storm."

Bernanke on unemployment: "The additional steps aren't as obvious or clear as the ones we've already taken. It's an enormous problem. There aren't easy solutions."

On questions about his handling of Lehman, AIG and Bear Stearns: "It's the price of success: People start to think you're omnipotent. We say we didn't have the authority, and it's 'Oh, you're the Fed. You could've come up with something.' "

On his background: "I'm not one of those people who look at this as some kind of video game. I come from Main Street, from a small town that's really depressed. This is all very real to me."

On banker pay: "I think that bankers ought to recognize that the government and the taxpayer saved the financial system from utter collapse last year. And in recognizing that, I would think that bankers ought to look in the mirror and decide that perhaps there should be some more restraint in how much they pay themselves, given what the government and the taxpayer did to protect the system."

Bernanke related to the CFR and Bilderberg Groups and never would answer what happened to the $13 Trillion Dollars that just vanished… Is he really your choice for person of the year??

-- Mark Silva - Image: Time Inc. via Bloomberg