Via Reuters:
BOSTON (Reuters) - The U.S. economy is growing robustly despite a slowing housing sector, although inflation remains above the central bank's comfort level, two top Federal Reserve officials said on Monday.
Making separate appearances at a business economics conference, Cathy Minehan and William Poole, heads of the Boston and St. Louis regional Fed banks respectively, sounded relatively optimistic about the economic outlook.
But while Minehan focused more extensively on the softness emerging from a decline in home purchases, Poole appeared a bit more worried about the possibility that inflation could gallop outside the central bank's grasp.
Stressing the importance of maintaining Fed credibility, Poole said inflation was running above the range he would prefer to see, and said that if it did not ease over the next 18 months that he would rather "act earlier rather than later."
It is hard to find signs of weakness outside of housing and autos -- real pce growth excluding autos and energy is over 6%.