The Federal Reserve is usually run by technocratic consensus. Today it is a battleground. On September 17 the Fed cut interest rates for the first time since December, by a quarter of a percentage point, to 4–4.25 per cent. One of its governors, Lisa Cook, could attend only because a court blocked President Donald Trump from sacking her.

Another, Stephen Miran, was confirmed just before the meeting for a short stint, after which he says he will return to his job at the White House. It is an unseemly arrangement for a central bank that should be independent of politics.

Mr Miran dissented in favour of a half-point rate cut. And he appears to have called for three such moves by the end of the year, twice what the next-most-doveish committee members suggested in their anonymous projections.

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