Last week, in the East Room of the White House, Kevin Warsh took the oath of office and became the 11th chairman of the Federal Reserve in the modern era. It was the first time a Fed chair had been sworn in at the White House since Alan Greenspan in 1987. The location was a statement before Warsh said a word.

President Trump told the assembled crowd he wanted Warsh to be "totally independent" -- then claimed later that morning that interest rates would be coming down "very quickly." The two statements are not easily reconciled. That contradiction is the entire story.

If you've never thought much about the Federal Reserve, the day it gets a new chairman is a reasonable time to start. The decisions Warsh makes in the next four years will determine what you pay for a mortgage, how much your car loan costs, and how much that grocery run costs in 2027. The Fed is not a Washington abstraction. It's the institution that decides whether your dollar stretches or shrinks.

Warsh, 56, holds a JD from Harvard Law, not the PhD most Fed chairs carry. He spent his formative years at Morgan Stanley, then joined the Bush White House before George W. Bush........

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