Ron Paul's "Audit the Fed" Bill Passes Resoundingly Through the House!!!

WASHINGTON -- In a rare moment of bipartisanship, the House
overwhelmingly passed a bill by Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) to audit the
Federal Reserve.

The bill, which has 270 co-sponsors, passed 327 to 98. All but one Republican voted for it, along with 89 Democrats.

Paul teamed up with former Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) in 2010 to pass
similar legislation that became part of the final Wall Street reform
bill. But Paul has said new audit legislation is needed because the 2010
bill didn't go far enough.
Specifically, he states on his website that the audit called for in the
2010 bill only focused on emergency credit programs and procedural
issues, rather than on the substantive details of the lending
transactions. The 2012 bill doesn't limit the focus of the audit.

Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke recently told the House Financial Services
Committee that he agrees with the "basic premise" that the Fed should be
transparent, but raised concerns that Paul's bill doesn't exempt
monetary policy and deliberations from its reach.

Not including an exemption on this point could create "a political
dampening effect on the Federal Reserve's policy decisions," Bernanke
warned.

But Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) pointed out that the House vote on the bill comes on the same day that the Washington Post reported
that the New York Fed "did not communicate in key meetings with top
regulators that British bank Barclays had admitted to Fed staffers that
it was rigging LIBOR,” the index which sets interest rates worldwide.

"The Fed creates trillions of dollars out of nothing and gives it to
banks. Congress is in the dark. The Fed sets the stage for the subprime
meltdown. Congress is in the dark. The Fed takes a dive on LIBOR.
Congress is in the dark. The Fed doesn’t tell regulators what is going
on. Congress is in the dark," Kucinich shouted on the House floor, just
before the vote.

"It is time for us to bring the Fed into the sunshine of accountability," he said.

Despite the broad support in the House, a senior Senate Democratic
aide signaled the bill isn't likely to go anywhere in that chamber in
the near future.

"Not this work period," the aide said about the Senate acting on the
bill ahead of the month-long August recess. "Don’t know about September,
but I doubt it."