Sherlock Holmes might have called it the case of the dog that didn’t bark.

About a month ago, Ben Bernanke, a former Princeton professor, was nominated to be Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board. Two weeks ago, Bernanke had his Senate confirmation hearing and vote. Neither event was treated as a Big Story, either by the media or by the financial markets.

This is at once surprising and highly complimentary to Bernanke. After all, Alan Greenspan has been chairman of the Fed for over 18 years. During that time, he has achieved almost mythical status in the financial markets and has become a kind of national guru on all things economic. There was reason to be worried that the markets might be jittery over losing their security blanket.

But apparently not. That’s a strong vote of confidence in Bernanke, who is a superb choice for the job.

What changes should we expect under Bernanke’s leadership? I start with another non-barking dog: Do not expect much change in monetary policy decisions. Like all of us, Bernanke admires the Greenspan record. He is also way too smart to abandon a successful strategy.

But talking about monetary policy will change. To this day, Greenspan steadfastly refuses to speak English. He’s made the markets learn to understand Greenspanspeak instead.

Bernanke will be quite different. He is plainspoken, has an amazingly clear and logical mind, and believes deeply in transparency. Get ready for explanations of policy decisions that you can actually understand.

I’m Alan Blinder.