There were rolling blackouts and natural gas delivery failures in the southwest, long bonds broke to new multi-month lows (that is, yields are rising), and Bernanke claimed that the Fed’s policies have nothing to do with global commodity price increases.
Those may sound like entirely unrelated events, but I see them as intimately connected. Here’s how:
First, I now have more detail on Mr. Bernanke’s statements yesterday about the role of the Federal Reserve in stoking global inflation, any connection to which he flatly denied:
Mr. Bernanke said the United States was not to blame for inflation in emerging economies, which have been growing at a much faster rate than the rich economies of Western Europe, North America and Japan.
The inflationary pressures, Mr. Bernanke said, arise from long-term trends — like the tendency of consumers to eat better as they move up from poverty, which tends to push up food prices — and suggest that some economies are pushing the limits of their capacity for growth.
He said that “emerging markets have all the tools they need to address excess demand in those countries,” and added, “They can adjust their exchange rates, which is something that they’ve been reluctant to do in some cases.”
(Source)
[sarcasm alert] Yes, it’s the tendency to eat better that is driving global food prices through the roof, not excess money and expenditures by the world’s largest economy.
by cmartenson 
