Today's the big day. We get to see the new Fed chief in his splendor at the first meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee. You don't even have to peep behind the curtain to find the humbug; it's right there where you can see it. The express purpose of the Open Market Committee is to subvert the open market.

Price fixing is illegal in other industries, but the honchos of central banking are allowed to collude to fix the most important price in an economy, the price of money. Every single one of them praises a free and open market. All read Adam Smith nodding their heads approvingly. None would dream of resorting to central planning on the Soviet model. But, not one of them would give up his membership in the elite centralized club of apparatchiks that determines Americans' short-term lending rates.

What makes them think they can know the precise rate at which we should borrow or lend? What makes them think that their judgment is better than that of the market itself? Why can't short-term lenders and short-term borrowers get together at whatever rate they want, rather than at the rate urged by the Fed?

Don't even bother to ask, dear reader. No one has an answer - save that these sages of easy money will help make sure the economy has the money it wants, rather than the money it actually has. There are times when lenders get worried, frightened, and tight. They think they see trouble coming and are reluctant to give up the bird in the hand for the two in the bush. They want to see three birds in the bush - or four. Maybe then they'll consider parting with their cash. It is at times such as these that the Fed flies to the rescue of the economy, all aflutter, with birds twittering in both fists.

But, we are getting off our subject. It is Monday morning; we will have to save the influence of ornithology on central banking for later in the week. Besides, we are still in "Good News" mode and there's no good news in the Fed's work.

*** Our good news, today, carries over from last week. We were delighted to discover - in the figures from economist Walter J. Williams - that the world really is going to hell in a handcart, just as we thought it was. If they did the numbers correctly, or even as they used to do them, unemployment would be twice today's reported levels, inflation would be higher, and the GDP would be shrinking.

This makes us feel better. Not that we want to the United States to go into recession - not at all - but we are pleased to see that what ought to happen...really does happen. Otherwise, we'd have to go back and examine our whole outlook on life. Maybe we'd become day traders, or put on saffron robes and join the Hare Krishna. We might even begin reading Thomas Friedman's work with admiration.

We are spared! We'd hate to lose the little dignity we have left. So, we thank the gods for these little signals...these little reassurances that things still work the way they are supposed to work. And yes, we saw another hint this weekend. We stood in front of the Uffizi museum in Florence and studied a sculpture at the entrance. The "Blue Guide" explained that it represented the "eternal and inevitable triumph of virtue over evil...reminding Florentines that good behavior was always rewarded, while sin and error were always "punished" or words to that effect.

Well there! That's the way it ought to be, isn't it? We looked again at the statue. It was a bronze of a beautiful woman with bare breasts and a sword in her hands about to cut off the head of some poor man. She had him on the ground, with her knee on his back and her left hand holding onto his hair. He was a goner, for sure.

And, if a people spend more than they can afford...if we borrow more than we can comfortably repay...if we become too concerned with the things of this world...coveting our neighbors' houses, perhaps, or envying their big screen TVs...we will be goners, too.

Now comes more bad news. First, the knockdown: New house sales fell 10.5% last month - the biggest drop in almost 10 years. Then, the knee to the
back: Gasoline prices rose 15 cents in the last two weeks, says the AP. Finally, , the terrible swift sword: Personal bankruptcy filings went up 30% last year. More than two million people went broke.

We can't help but like Italy's head of state, Silvio Berlusconi. Asked what he would say to poor people, he didn't lie or mumble. He stated, "I'd tell them to earn more money," he said.

But what can you say to America's lower-middle classes, who are growing poorer every day? Earn more money? How? On the globalized labor market, they are already overpaid. Maybe they should learn some new skills?

But what's this? "Retraining laid-off workers...for what?" asks the New York Times.

We wonder too.

Bill Bonner is the President of Agora Publishing.  For more on Bill Bonner, visit The Daily Reckoning.