section discusses the federal reserve is an independent agency of the government. This means that although the president selects members of...

The Fed was made independent so that it can make its
economic decisions without being pressured by the public or by the elected
officials.

If the Fed were controlled by the President or
Congress, it would come under major pressure to do what those people want.  The Fed
would not be able to do what they think best based on their economic expertise.  The
idea is that they might do things that are foolish in the long term just to satisfy the
short term needs of the elected officials.

Basically, it
would be like letting students pick how much they were going to work or kids pick how
much candy they could have -- they'd be likely to do things that would be bad in the
long term.