Calling him "the most powerful nerd in the world," and crediting him for saving the economy from catapulting into a depression, Time Magazine today named Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke its Person of the Year.

Though Bernanke's actions have been criticized from the right and the left, the magazine, defends what he and the other board members did to perform the economic equivalent of stopping the bleeding.

He "knows the economy would be much, much worse if the Fed had not taken such extreme measures to stop the panic. There's a vast difference between 10% and 25% unemployment, between anemic and negative growth. He wishes Americans understood that he helped save the irresponsible giants of Wall Street only to protect ordinary folks on Main Street. He knows better than anyone how financial crises spiral into global disasters, how the grass gets crushed when elephants fall," the magazine wrote in its story, which it posted online today.