Federal Reserve Bank of Saint Louis

I stuck my head into my favorite conservative’s office today, the Perma-Bear (PB), and offered up some free advice on his television programming for tonight. He got the joke and laughed. It’s the State of the Union Address tonight, in case you didn’t. President Obama will address the Nation and Congress. The PB corrected me, “You mean Dictator Obama?” He was referring to Obama’s plan to go it alone this year and utilize the power of presidential decrees to help move our country forward. I guess tyrant is how Fox is now characterizing the President. Trying to lighten the conversation, I told him that Vance McAllister (R) of LA-5 is inviting one of the actors from “Duck Dynasty” as his date. This seems a little gay, not that there is anything wrong with that. Anyway, it’s safe to say that the PB won’t be watching the speech tonight, but I will.

Before I got booted from his office, I changed the subject to one of his favorites, the economy. Ben Bernanke is retiring as Fed Chairman this week. I had to tread lightly here, because I know that the PB thinks even less of Helicopter Ben than he does of Obama. Bernanke earned this nickname in conservative circles for his activist running of the Fed. He was being compared to a helicopter parent long before he began pumping $85B a month into the US economy. So, I dared not mention what I heard on NPR while shuttling back-and-forth to the Land of Broken Toys today. Really, I dare not even mention NPR. It was one of the mid-day talk shows and it was about Bernanke. I caught the ending where the three guest economists were asked to grade the Fed Chief. The liberal gave him an A, the moderate gave an A- and even the conservative gave him a B+.

Instead of NPR, I told the PB about my encounter on Saturday with the Fed. I was wandering around downtown and happened upon Federal Reserve Plaza. Saint Louis is still host to one of the thirteen Fed branches. Being the fourth largest city in America, when the Fed was formed, still has its perks. What impressed me most about the building, were the interlaced bars on all of the windows. They looked like they meant business. So, I stopped to take a few pictures and after only a couple of clicks an armed guard walks out of the building, right under the American flag. He checks me out and without being asked, I moved along. When I told the PB all of this, he joked that I’m now in some FBI database and the black helicopters will be coming for me soon. I just hope that it doesn’t happen until after Obama’s State of the Union. It can go down during the Republican rebuttal, that’s OK. I’m down with that.