The Fed used every legal means at its disposal to prevent detailed information about its support programs to both domestic and foreign banks from leaking to the general public. The vociferous libertarian and gold standard advocate Congressman Ron Paul ran a vigorous campaign for Fed transparency, which Bernanke did his best to ward off. Only in June 2009 did the Fed begin publishing regular reports on the uptake of swap lines. The fuller records of the Fed’s emergency programs, on which this chapter is based, were not opened to the public until December 2010 and March 2011.
