obliged to ignore unemployment even as that issue becomes increasingly important in the blix of the region it's responsible for. oblijed to pretend to respect its charter when circumstances dictate that in fact it deviate from it. and it would put the federal reserve in a perpetually difficult, i think false position before congress really make it very difficult for the federal reserve to report forthrightly on what it's doing. i think it would equally put the congress in an extremely difficult position as unlikely european central bang which is an independent entity, the federal reserve is not and cannot be independent of congress. it is a creature of congress under the constitution. i think that creating a rigid price stability mandate would create difficulties that we created over the definition of money. if one looked at the notional definitions of inflation presently in use, i think you would find that the federal reserve did not in fact violate its price stability mandate in the run up to the great crisis. it's very hard to know before the fact when it was doing something that was no

at the atlantic council that we observe the fascinating reemergence of something akin to rile and blix politics in russia, since last fall and since the highly problematic dumia elections that took place in 2004 and the wave of demonstrations that have taken place in the weeks and months that have followed. those of us who care deeply about russia found encouraging that the country, or at least important segments of it seem to have woken up from relative slumber to speak out and act publicly on important issues that the country faces. russia has now completed its presidential election cycle. the march election produced its largely preordained result and vladimir putin was inaugurated on monday, march 7th. soap the putin regime will continue but the demonstrations will continue as well so, too, does the public sentiment that is seriously less accepting, less accommodating of authoritarian and oshtory governance and corruption. the newly heard voices of populism and some of the substantive issues russia faces today, we're pleased to welcome vladimir kara-murza. a journalist and author, h