inserting a timestamp show wrong timezone

When I create a table & insert records, I am getting the wrong timezone info
(-04)
When I insert using now() -- the timezone is right (-05)
I am on EST.   Please help --

example:

 insert into foo  values (3, '12-aug-2001:00:01:01');
insert into foo values (4,now());
showaltb=> select * from foo;
 n |           t
---+------------------------
 3 | 2001-08-12 00:01:01-04
 4 | 2002-02-20 08:59:56-05