The Fed didn't raise interest rates yesterday, but it did announce its next attempt to give our lumbering economy a much-needed kick in the butt. Dubbed "Operation Twist", the Fed aims to lower long-term interest rates by selling about $400 billion in short-term government bonds and then using that money to purchase longer-duration bonds like mortgage-backed securities.  The name stems from a similar Fed effort back in 1961 when Chubby Checker's song "The Twist" was at the top of the charts.  It kind of worked back then, so the Fed is hoping for the best this time around.

Chase pulled the plug last month on its popular 50,000 bonus point Southwest Premier card offer. However, As of Monday August 8th 2011, its replacement hit the market—the 25,000 point Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards Plus credit card. This is a pretty standard offer from Southwest, so I wouldn't say it's anything to get too excited about. If you don't need the card right away so you can redeem the 25,000 points, you may want to try waiting for a better promotion to hit the market in the coming months. It could very well happen towards the end of the year or in early 2012.

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The CFPB is off to a rough start.  Still without a Director and lacking the day-to-day guidance of its mastermind Elizabeth Warren, I can't say this comes as a huge surprise.

The bureau did manage to get its much-anticipated credit card complaint system up and running by the time doors officially opened for business in late July.  Unfortunately, it wasn't running well.  Complaints logged by consumers weren't even getting forwarded to credit card companies for investigation due to technical glitches in the CFPB's system. Oops!

 Dear Creditnet: I have finally received my first credit card for bad credit after bankruptcy. My question is do I charge $400 to the card and make minimum payments over time to establish a track record, or do I charge $40 to $50 monthly and pay off the entire balance?

Congress has pushed through a last-minute bill that will arrive on President Obama's desk this afternoon. In addition, the White House has already stated that even though this bill is imperfect, the President will immediately sign it to ensure the debt ceiling is raised and our government is able to continue paying its bills.

Hurray, the debt ceiling crisis has been averted. Way to go guys and gals! You beat the deadline by a few hours…it's a miracle.