Central banks do big rate cut /
Throw the Fed bums out?
1. The central banks of the US, Canada, the European Union, Great Britain, Switzerland and Sweden, all cut the interbank rates they control by half a percentage this morning.
The US stock markets gyrated wildly, with the Dow 30 winding up down 191 points.
Bernanke last month told Congress that a year ago he had warned Paulson that something dramatic (like the Paulson Plan) might eventually have to be done.
The time to act was indeed a year ago. Nothing but a lot of time and pain will cure what now ails the global system.
2. The US has had something like five central banks (empowered to issue the currency and lend it to the government) thru its history.  Jefferson and his school were against the idea, the Federalists led by Alexander Hamilton were for.
Some people are convinced the federal government cannot recover its fiscal health unless it takes back the power to issue currency, as was last done under President Andrew Jackson. It was 77 years until, in 1913, a private central bank was again established on the eve of the world wars.
Here’s a feature length doc about the history of central banks in Europe and the US, made by people hoping to dethrone the Fed.
