Inflation problems look HUGE; will Big Ben pay attention?

Wholesale prices jumped 7.4 percent last year, the worst showing since 1981. The euro has now cracked the $1.50 mark and oil briefly crested over $102/bbl. Gas could hit $4/gallon on the coasts this spring. A number of oil analysts are talking oil around $140/bbl by 2015; frankly, those estimates are probably still too conservative.

“An oil crisis is coming in the next 10 years,” John B. Hess, the chairman of the Hess Corporation, said at a recent conference held by Cambridge Energy Research Associates. “It’s not a matter of demand. It’s not a matter of supplies. It’s both.”

And, in the face of all this?

Federal Reserve chief Ben Bernanke insists the Fed has to keep an eye on inflation. All he is doing is telling the titty babies of Wall Street they’ll only get a quarter-point rate cut instead of a half-point cut in March.