By GREG IP
October 31, 2007; Page A1
WASHINGTON -- On the afternoon of Thursday, Aug. 9, with a panic driving up short-term interest rates in Europe and the U.S., Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke's office became a war room. His closest advisers took seats in the burgundy leather chairs around a coffee table or telephoned in from their now-aborted vacations.
![[Ben Bernanke]](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_vuOeVQ_R3lGwYO88RMbV6xaGSFjLHiaFKIubt9Cc2v4_-CMZDyVNyFGrO5hEqTYW2Sv6jHuA6CKEyZk9setDJmFQ9wJyOFwCxmWWlk4hn-64vx15OrsnguX0WOkab3QVsKcrQQGzsjp2uc7QOZcoWK3MzB=s0-d)
Mr. Bernanke, a former academic vaulted 18 months earlier to the world's most powerful economic job, was seeking counsel from colleagues of all stripes, from a thirtysomething former investment banker to a Federal Reserve veteran of nearly four decades who had participated in almost every important Fed decision of the past 20 years. He pushed them to spit out as much information as possible about the day's events. What, he asked, do we know? What must we learn? And what are our options?
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119374975769376194.html
