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Economy

Helicopter Ben Becomes Calamity Ben

Photo of Douglas A. McIntyre
By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Published

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Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke is speaking to the Senate Budget Committee this morning. Bernanke appears support the White House plan to stimulate the economy.  He argued that aggressive actions are needed to avoid economic calamity.  Interestingly enough, he didn’t talk the budget or tax hikes in detail.

Bernanke noted that employment conditions have weakened in recent weeks and that there is little sign of economic improvement.  He also noted that cap-ex plans from business are being delayed.

What is interesting is that Bernanke said that actions must be taken to restore stability and that Fed Funds are likely to stay very low for some time.  It has new lending facilities and expanded existing facilities as an alternative to cutting rates further.

There is a lack of political mouth-piecing here that may have existed in times past.  Bernanke is urging action, but sustainable action that can be kept in pace with the finances and tools available.

Here are the full text of Bernanke’s testimony.

JON C. OGG
MARCH 3, 2009

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About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.

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