Below The Beltway

For a guy on vacation, President Obama continues to make a lot news:

OAK BLUFFS, Mass., Aug. 25 — President Obama on Tuesday renominated Ben Bernanke for another term as chairman of the Federal Reserve, citing “his background, his temperament, his courage, and his creativity” as reasons he should continue in the nation’s most powerful economic policy making job.

With Bernanke at his side in a schoolhouse-turned-briefing room on this vacation island, Obama said Bernanke has helped to steer the country through one of its worst financial crises.

“Ben approached a financial system on the verge of collapse with calm and wisdom; with bold action and out-the-box thinking that has helped put the brakes on our economic freefall,” Obama said.

In brief remarks after Obama’s announcement, Bernanke praised the president for his “unwavering support for a strong and independent Federal Reserve” and thanked his colleagues for “remarkable resourcefulness, dedication and stamina under difficult conditions.”

Bernanke said that if confirmed again by the Senate, he will pursue a “solid foundation for growth and stability” during a second four-year term and promised to work “to restore a more stable financial and economic environment in which opportunity can again flourish.”

What’s unstated, of course, is the fact that in reappointing Bernanke, Obama is once again embracing the failed policies of his predecessor in the Oval Office:

In re-appointing Bernanke to another four year term as Fed chairman, President Obama completes his embrace of bailouts, easy money and deficits as the defining characteristics of his economic agenda.

Bernanke, along with Secretary Geithner (then New York Fed president) were the prime movers behind the bailouts of AIG and Bear Stearns. Rather than “saving capitalism,” these bailouts only spread panic at considerable cost to the taxpayer. As evidenced in his “financial reform” proposal, Obama does not see bailouts as the problem, but instead believes an expanded Fed is the solution to all that is wrong with the financial sector.

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Re-appointing Bernanke sends the worst possible message to both the American public and to government in general: not only will failure be tolerated, it will be rewarded.

So, along with The Welfare State, The Nanny State, and The National Security State, we now have The Bailout State.

Well, there is one good thing; with Bernanke in charge of the Fed for another four years, he’ll probably be around when the shit truly hits the fan so we’ll know how to blame.