Senator Bunning on the Bernanke reappointment (12/14)

Senator Jim Bunning (R-KY) offered the following prepared comments during the December 3 reappointment hearing of Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke. This is part twelve in a fourteen part series:

Instead of taking that money and lending to consumers and cleaning up their balance sheets, the banks started to pocket record profits and pay out billions of dollars in bonuses. Because you bowed to pressure from the banks and refused to resolve them or force them to clean up their balance sheets and clean out the management, you have created zombie banks that are only enriching their traders and executives. You are repeating the mistakes of Japan in the 1990s on a much larger scale, while sowing the seeds for the next bubble. In the same letter where you refused to admit any responsibility for inflating the housing bubble, you also admitted that you do not have an exit strategy for all the money you have printed and securities you have bought. That sounds to me like you intend to keep propping up the banks for as long as they want.

And the Senate Banking Committee voted on the Bernanke confirmation today. HuffPost's Cate Long lists the votes of the 23 Senators. Unsurprisingly, the Banking Chairman Chris Dodd (Political Class - CT) led the charge to stay the course with Bailout Ben.

I really don't get Senator Dodd. He had the opportunity to derail the reappointment of a man who has been an absolute catastrophe for everyone who does not work on Wall Street. But instead, Dodd chooses Wall Street over Main Street.

Tim White