In Deception and Abuse at the Fed, Robert Auerbach, a former banking committee investigator, recounts major instances of Fed mismanagement and abuse of power that were exposed by Rep. Gonzalez, including:
- Blocking Congress and the public from holding powerful Fed officials accountable by falsely declaring–for 17 years–it had no transcripts of its meetings;
- Manipulating the stock and bond markets in 1994 under cover of a preemptive strike against inflation;
- Allowing 5.5 billion to be sent to Saddam Hussein from a small Atlanta branch of a foreign bank–the result of faulty bank examination practices by the Fed;
- Stonewalling Congressional investigations and misleading the Washington Post about the6,300 found on the Watergate burglars.
Some people found the questions put to Bernanke by Ron Paul on Wednesday to be strange. Bernanke called them “bizarre”. But Paul knows what he’s talking about. And by the way, he is probably correct about The Fed getting involved in bailing out Greece currently as well.
