Political Quotes

“I am about to engage in an exercise which is clearly second best. The Federal Reserve Open Market Committee a couple of weeks ago decided that we were creating too many jobs too rapidly in America and, fearing that this would be destabilizing, they raised interest rates. The Federal Reserve Open Market Committee will meet again in May and July, and there is a very real prospect that they may do this again. No single set of specific decisions taken, I believe, by anybody in the government so far this year or for the next few months, will have the impact on our economy that these decisions have had. Yet, they will be going largely undebated in this Congress because the Committee on Banking and Financial Services, which has under our rules jurisdiction over this matter, has refused to have a hearing. Specifically, the gentleman from Iowa [Mr. Leach], the chairman of the committee, has refused a request from all but one of the non-Republican members. Twenty-four of the Democrats and the one Independent have written to him and said, please, this is an essential issue, let us have a hearing. The chairman says to have a hearing, to have a hearing on whether or not they should continue to raise interest rates to choke off growth would be second-guessing the Fed and tampering with its independence. I wish we could have that hearing, and I hope that the chairman will reconsider, and maybe some of the majority Members will join us.”