http://www.huffingtonpost.com/cenk-uygur/hell-no-on-bernanke_b_379268.html

First RI. I have been watching the silver thread, waiting for someone to drop something bad enough that I can get my RI out of the way and start shitposting with the least amount of effort possible. And...I think we've done it. Thanks, /u/DeltronZLB, for sharing this in the silver thread in which I so cravenly lurk with shitposts ready to fire, and thanks, of course, to Cenk, without whom none of this would be possible.

---

I had large misgivings about Ben Bernanke before his hearings began. He’s given credit for steering our economy to safe shores after we hit an enormous economic iceberg. First, I would argue we are nowhere near safe shores.

Would you argue that? Care to offer any evidence? Any reasoning? Just one lousy sentence in support of that claim? No? Alright.

Second, why are we rehiring the guy who steered the Titanic into the iceberg in the first place?

Hoooooo. First of all, it's widely accepted that the housing bubble was the primary cause of the recession. Bernanke became Fed chair in 2006, which was the same year that home prices peaked. So, even if you believe that the Fed chair has these magical economic powers to eliminate the business cycle, the person to blame here would be Bernanke's predecessor, Alan Greenspan.

Of course, that would also be a silly thing to argue. The Federal Reserve, contrary to popular belief, does not set the interest rates on your mortgage! They can, however, influence interest rates like that using open market operations to change the supply of money in the economy. So, that would be a plausible way that the Fed was responsible for the low mortgage rates...except for the fact that money supply growth (not MZM, M2, M1, monetary base, nothing) decreased from 2005 through 2006. The low interest rates was more likely due to a savings glut and other federal policies that encouraged homeownership like the Community Reinvestment Act. To call the Fed the cause of the recession would be oversimplification, if not simply wrong. And even if that were true the chair of the Fed would be Alan Greenspan, not the guy about whom you're writing the damn article!

He just said in his hearings that he would get more money by going after Social Security and Medicare.

I honestly have no idea what "get more money" means in this context. Like seriously, what on earth does it mean? The Federal Reserve is not subject to the federal budget. They can print their own money if they need it so bad, for Pete's sake. Can someone please enlighten me? More on the rest later.

When Sen. Reed suggested that we could also get the money by taxing some of the richest people in America (some of whom got rich causing the economic crash in the first place), all of sudden he demurred. He says that’s not his place to say if we should ever raise taxes.

Correct on Bernanke's part. The Fed is apolitical; they are not in the business of crafting taxation policy.

He even has the nerve to quote famous bank robber Willie Sutton by saying that he would go after Social Security and Medicare because “that’s where the money is.”

Disregarding the ambiguity of what "go after" means (how can Ben Bernanke "go after" SS or Medicare?), he is factually correct that that's where the money is. Healthcare and Social Security each accounted for about a quarter of US expenditures in 2015, so that is indeed "where the money is."

From his perspective, he doesn’t consider raising taxes of the wealthiest people in the country, or even more pertinent the taxes on financial transactions, as even a remote possibility.

He's the chairman of the Federal Reserve. He doesn't control policy. Good grief. *(N.B. financial transaction tax is a v bad idea.)

On top of all this, he refuses to disclose where the Fed distributes its money and says we shouldn’t audit the Fed to find out where they send trillions of our dollars to. Is this a joke?

God, I hope it is. Remember about how the Fed is not political? Yeah, a Congressional audit of the Fed would kinda end that. Here it is, straight from the Bernke's mouth.

Ben Bernanke is the definition of the status quo. He is part and parcel of the Washington and Wall Street establishment that caused our economic problems in the first place.

Damn neoliberals pooping in my cornflakes n stuff.

In conclusion, praise bernke and I need flair + shitposting priviliges pls