Tom Harkin: “But to say we cannot vote to tell the Fed what to do because it would be politicizing it or we cannot interfere I…”

“But to say we cannot vote to tell the Fed what to do because it would be politicizing it or we cannot interfere I believe somehow is an abdication of our responsibilities, not only our rights but our responsibilities as policymakers to tell a creature of the Congress what we believe they should do. We do not do it very often in terms of the Fed. In fact, I pointed out the last time we had a Sense of the Congress calling on the Fed to lower interest rates was in 1982. So this is not something we take lightly. But I believe at this point in time, with the world economy being what it is, with the tremendous drop in commodities and commodity prices here and around the world, with the specter of depression and deflation facing us--almost every economist, conservative, liberal, head of the Business Roundtable, head of General Motors, head of the National Association of Manufacturers, all say the Fed should lower interest rates. I offered this amendment, along with others, in good faith, to back them up to say, yes, you should lower interest rates.”