bernan bernanke, a bunch of different folks. and to run through the quick history in your forecast of last year, y'all expected inflation, talking about the cpi now for urban workers, pick any measure you want but use them across this same analysis. you thought it would be 1.3%. in august you adjusted that up to assumption of 2.8%. finished the year at 3.3%. at the same time that we saw actual rates of inflation that were higher than your estimates you didn't change the assumptions for 2012, roughly the same, 1.3% last january, 1.3% again in august and 1.4% for yesterday. that grabbed my attention and led me to the next slide, which i want to ask you about, which is that we took a look at your projections for cpiu for the next five-year window. the first five-year window and second five-year window. slightly different off by a year because they're a rolling number but let's call the first year the five-year window. you have, despite the fact that inflation turned out to be considerably higher last year than you expected, you act

bernan bernanke, do you do your own shopping at the grocery store asked by congressman paul, and why did he ask that? >> because the price of food has been increasing, and when the fed talks about the price of inflation they say they want the prices and the wages to increase no more than 2% per year, and food is increasing more than that, and the fed does not include food prices in the calculation of inflation, because the food prices fluctuate up and down quite a bit and the same reason they don't include gas prices in that measure, but what mr. paul is noting is that for ordinary americans buying food and gas living the ordinary lives, inflation can be a significant force than the numbers show, and challenging mr. bernanke saying that isn't inflation actually more of a problem than the fed is acknowledging. >> and bringing an ounce of silver to the hearing, what was that about? >> well, senator paul has a long history of arguing dr. paul, and that is that american currency should be exchanged for precious metals which it was for a long time and it was the called the gold standard w

having one is bad for growth -- >> i have no pin, the white house has no opinion on chairman bernan bernanke'sn whether the senate after 1,000 days should pass a budget. >> it's funnily, obviously they would lufz nothing more than the republicans to introduce a budget so they could just kill them. >> over 1,000 days. >> i'm less concerned about that than the hypocrisy of them loving the idea of paul ryan reintroducing his budget and then making it an election issue. >> do you have a question about the media -- >> the media? i'm not speaking for the media. i'mi i just pointed out an incredible. >> does it get more coverage? >> i think it gets a fair amount. it's always talked about. >> by republicans. >> who's talking about it? >> we're talking about it now. >> seriously, mark halperin, what would the "new york times" editorial page say about a senate who didn't produce a budget in over 1,000 days. >> i think it would be creamed. the conventional wisdom is nothing will happen this year. this is a quarter of the president's first term and maybe only term in office. he's going to put out a budget