Texas Congressman Ron Paul, who will take control of the House subcommittee that oversees the Federal Reserve in the new year, has re-emphasized his belief that the Federal Reserve should be abolished, but warned that turning ideas into reality takes time and effort.
Paul, author of the book “End the Fed,” told Bloomberg News today that his first action in the job will be to “think things through and not over-do things too soon.”
When asked if he intends to end the Fed, the Congressman replied “not right up front, but obviously that is the implication.”
“Even in my book about ending the Fed, I talk about not turning the keys and locking the doors, I talk about a transition.” Paul added.
The Congressman spoke about how he would go about reining in the Federal Reserve and the reasons he believes it is vital to do so.
“I’ll have plans for hearings to find out how much information we can get. Obviously it is very popular with the American people to audit the Fed, to know what they are doing.” Paul said.
“They can spend trillions of dollars and we don’t know where it goes. They have a bigger budget, they spend more money than the Congress does, and yet we have no oversight. It was never intended that a secret body like this could create money out of thin air and spend it, take care of some banks and big business and foreign banks while the American people struggle.” the Congressman added.
In response to comments from Barney Frank, the outgoing chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, that many establishment Republicans do not share Paul’s views on the Fed, the Congressman stated “I think that’s good advice.”
“If next week I issue a subpoena for such and such, I don’t think that would be met with a good acceptance,” Paul said. “And it’s not like I am a powerful person. My ideas are powerful but there is a committee chairman and a speaker of the House. I’m realistic and I know what that means. But I also know the strength of ideas and the power of ideas, and that’s what will prevail.” the Congressman urged.
Paul was selected to head up the domestic monetary policy subcommittee earlier this week by incoming House Financial Services chairman Spencer Bachus.
“This is the leadership team that crafted the first comprehensive financial reform bill to put an end to the bailouts, wind down the taxpayer funding of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and enforce a strong audit of the Federal Reserve,” the Alabama Republican said in a statement, referring to legislation to audit the fed that Ron Paul introduced earlier in the year.
The bill eventually gained the support of 320 members of the House and staved off several attempts to derail it before a portion of the measure ended up in the Dodd-Frank financial regulatory overhaul.
“What I want to do is emphasize the oversight of the Federal Reserve, pursue this idea of auditing the Fed.” Paul said today. “We have a right to know, Congress has an obligation to know, the people want to know and Congress is behind us to do that right now.”
“We have to look into it and we have to start to consider reforms.” the Congressman said.
“I think it’s also very important for us to understand why monetary policy is so dangerous and why we should think about changing the Fed and getting rid of the Fed, and that is their contribution to unemployment, their contribution to the business cycle.” Paul added.
“They are the instigators of inflation. So for many many years, until at least three years ago, they were always given the credit for boom times and it was always thought that they could get us out of the bad times, but that no longer plays out because it isn’t true.”
“They give us the inflation but then they also give us bubbles that eventually always burst. But we are now in a serious problem with the financial markets and the monetary markets, and already many people around the world are talking about monetary reform, the dollar will not last as a reserve standard.” the Congressman warned.
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