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Ron Paul’s pick for Fed chair: No one

By
Stephen Gandel
Stephen Gandel
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By
Stephen Gandel
Stephen Gandel
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August 9, 2013, 2:41 PM ET

FORTUNE — The bids of Larry Summers and Janet Yellen to replace Ben Bernanke just took a hit.

Ron Paul, the famously libertarian politician and former presidential candidate, has his own choice for the next chair of the Federal Reserve, and it isn’t Summers or Yellen. Paul’s pick for the next Fed head: No one.

Here’s what Paul had to say via a spokesperson:

Dr. Paul would prefer we get rid of central economic planning via a central bank. All mentioned candidates believe that one person or a committee has the knowledge to dictate the correct interest rate and rate of growth of the money supply, which they do not.

The main point is that Dr. Paul doesn’t believe the current failed policies of the Reserve would change if any of the mentioned candidates were to become Fed Chair.

The above statement leaves open the possibility that Paul might support someone for Fed chair. But in a follow up e-mail with his spokesperson, she confirmed that Paul’s current top pick for Fed chair was, indeed, no one. If he had to pick, she said he wouldn’t.

MORE: The bailout Wall Street is blocking from Main Street

Paul penned the book End the Fed in 2009, and is now the chairman for the Campaign for Liberty. The organization’s website says its mission is to promote and defend liberty. As part of that mission, the non-profit organization opposes the Fed “for economic and moral reasons.” It says the U.S. “central bank’s ability to create money out of thin air transfers wealth from the most vulnerable to those with political pull,” and that the Fed had “reduced the value of the dollar by 95 percent since it began in 1913.”

In an interview with Bloomberg Businessweek, Senator Rand Paul ( R-KY), who is Ron Paul’s son, said his preferred choice for the next chairman of the Federal Reserve would be either Friedrich Hayek or Milton Friedman, both of whom are dead.

On Wednesday, Fortune magazine accurately pre-predicted that the next chairman of the Federal Reserve will be Larry Summers.

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By Stephen Gandel
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