“We have an unfortunate tendency in this country to treat people as either heroes or villains, with no gradations in between. Take Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke. He’s being called exceptionally vicious names by right-wing types for supposedly undermining our currency and planting the seeds for future inflation—while also being excoriated by liberals for not doing enough to help the economy. I don’t know about you, but I’ve had enough of the hero-or-villain standard. Bernanke isn’t a villain; he’s not a hero. He’s just a guy trying to do a complicated, high-pressure job the best he can, making plenty of mistakes along the way. I’m no Fed lover. But the Fed deserves credit and respect for acting, as opposed to Washington’s other major players, who are doing nothing but talking and posturing.”
Allan Sloan in Fortune
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
Film reviews: Superman and Sorry, BabyFeature A hero returns, in surprising earnest, and a woman navigates life after a tragedy
-
Music reviews: Lorde, Barbra Streisand, and Karol GFeature "Virgin," "The Secret of Life: Partners, Volume Two," and "Tropicoqueta"
-
AMC hopes new ticket discounts will reinvigorate the movie theater industryIn the Spotlight The theater chain now has 50% discounts on both Tuesdays and Wednesdays
-
Issue of the week: Do high-speed traders rig the market?feature Wall Street is abuzz over high-frequency trading.
-
Issue of the week: How Yellen spooked the markets
feature At her first press conference, the new Federal Reserve chair made the mistake of indicating when the Fed would raise interest rates.
-
Stop calling women ‘bossy’
feature Let’s ban “She’s bossy.” Instead, let’s try, “She has executive leadership skills.”
-
Issue of the week: GM’s recall disaster
feature Mary Barra is facing “her first big test” since she took over as GM’s new CEO in January: a recall of more than 1.6 million vehicles.
-
Issue of the week: Who gets Fannie’s and Freddie’s profits?
feature Fannie Mae’s and Freddie Mac’s shareholders want their money back.
-
Issue of the week: Comcast buying Time Warner Cable
feature Has Comcast won the cable wars?
-
Issue of the week: AOL’s million-dollar babies
feature AOL’s “gaffe-prone” CEO, Tim Armstrong, “got in some hot water” last week.
-
Issue of the week: Why Google unloaded Motorola
feature Three years after shelling out $12.5 billion for Motorola, Google announced its sale to Lenovo Group for $2.9 billion.