Ryan to Fed: Why are you trying to lower unemployment?

The "let them eat cake" congressman from southern Wisconsin is at it again.

At a House Budget Committee hearing yesterday, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-You Kidding) chastised Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke for simultaneously trying to lower inflation and stimulate job growth, even questioning whether it's the Fed's proper mission to worry about jobs (it is, actually).

Ryan's puerile stance boiled down to: Why is the Fed trying to stimulate job growth when inflation is up? Gee, congressman, why would anyone from your party want to focus on jobs?

The Associated Press summarized the meeting this way:

Ryan criticized the Fed's decision to establish an annual inflation target of 2 percent. He said Bernanke seemed willing to accept higher inflation in order to get lower unemployment.

Yup. The chair of the powerful House Budget Committee is far more worried about inflation than about helping tens of millions of Americans get back to work. Never mind that if you don't have a job, inflation is the least of your problems. Nothing times nothing is still nothing.

Throughout the hearing, Ryan and his fellow Republicans on the budget committee seemed to be channeling presidential candidate Mitt Romney's statement this week that he simply didn't care about the poorest Americans. Of course the underlying ideology remains: Fix the economy for rich folks and hep will trickle down.

The dripping faucet theory of the economy began under Reagan and we're still waiting for the drips to come through.

UPDATE: John Nichols of The Nation has more.  And the Capital Times editorializes on Paul Ryan's cruelest ploy.