The Times credited one Mary F. Calvert with the picture. She no doubt went for the powerful-man-alone-in-the-hall-of-power effect; that Citizen Kane stuff, you know. Even the security guard was removed from his post!
My advice to Ms. Calvert is to keep her day job; she must have one. Her unpardonable error is not so much poor staging but the lack of attention to lighting – that Alpha and Omega of the art of taking pictures. The light from the window behind Bernanke creates a halo around his head. But that contradicts Bernanke’s sheepish posture and look, which is not that of a saint but of a mark. Eleventh-century Russian icons looked more alive!
Why does a man with the power to move the world’s economies obey so absurd a “sit” command and agrees to be photographed on a chair in front of elevators? Too polite to say No? Yielding to the judgment of a seemingly professional photographer? Not being aware of the situation at all?
I have already written about Bernanke’s personality traits. They are the character traits of functionaries and palan doozan. Such men are in positions of power precisely because they obey – unquestioningly and every time.
But obey who – or what? Who calls the shots?
The answer is, in the particular point in history we are living, speculative capital.
I will return with parts 2 and 3 of Conspiracy Theory to elaborate.
