Geithner and Summers must go

(11 am. – promoted by ek hornbeck)

Sure, it’s only been 61 days.  Who could have pulled our economy out of depression it is in any faster?  

Those are great questions, if, that is, they actually pertained to this subject; the economy.  So, let me explain why both need to get fired.

Three-days after the November 4th Presidential Election, where Sen. Obama became President Obama, we were already getting word.

Obama’s economic team:

1 – William Daley – Chairman of the Midwest, JP Morgan Chase; Former Secretary, U.S. Dept of Commerce, 1997-2000

2 – Robert Reich – University of California, Berkeley; Former Secretary, U.S. Dept of Labor, 1993-1997

3 – Penny Pritzker – CEO, Classic Residence by Hyatt

4 – Roger Ferguson – President and CEO, TIAA-CREF and former Vice Chairman of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve, 1997-2000

5 – Lawrence Summers – Harvard University; Managing Director, D.E. Shaw; Former Secretary, U.S. Dept of Treasury, 1999-2001



6 – Anne Mulcahy – Chairman and CEO, Xerox

7 – Richard Parsons – Chairman of the Board, Time Warner

8 – Paul Volcker – Former Chairman, U.S. Federal Reserve 1979-1987

9 – Rahm Emanuel – United States Representative (IL-05)

10 – Jennifer Granholm – Governor, State of Michigan

11 – Robert Rubin – Director and Senior Counselor, Citigroup; Former Secretary, U.S. Dept of Treasury, 1995-1999



12 – David Bonior – Member House of Representatives (Michigan) 1977-2003

13 – Laura Tyson – (Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley; Former Chairman, National Economic Council, 1995-1996; Former Chairman, President’s Council of Economic Advisors, 1993-1995)

14 – Antonio Villaraigosa – Mayor, City of Los Angeles

15 – William Donaldson – Former Chairman of the SEC, 2003-2005

16 – Eric Schmidt – Chairman and CEO, Google

17 – Roel Campos – Former Commissioner of the SEC, 2002-2007

As I showed in this list, we already knew that Summers was coming on board.  My thoughts on that were:

I mean… come on… wtf!  Out of 17 people, you have 10 that have ZERO business being involved with trying to straighten out the economic mess we are in, 3 who seem to no qualification whatsoever other than being a politician, and CEO/Chair persons of big business who have lapped up Bush’s tax cuts/breaks for the wealthy AND big corporations!

All I can say is that this economic team better be there to answer ONE question and ONE question only, “TELL ME HOW YOU ALL SCREWED UP SO I CAN GET OTHERS TO FIX IT”, cause if this is the team that is to FIX the problem, “change” is soooo screwed.  

Well, Bernake is running the Fed, Geithner is running the Treasury, and Summers is still advising everyone.  

What this has produced is a “deer in the headlight” looking Geithner as he tries to push the same bad plans through the anger and angest on Main St., looking like a fool who is clueless because of it.

Why doesn’t the “It’s only been 61 days” argument stand up?

If Geithner and Wall ST were going at it, daily, were at an impasse even, but the fight had been engaged, only Republicans would be calling for his ouster.  Instead, we get Geithner trying to pass the same old, useless ideas because he was, is, and has been, too close to be able to affect real change, much less ANY change at all.

Everybody understands that this will take time.  What people will not, ever, agree with, is that we taxpayers have no choice but to bailout these exec’s because they are the cream of the crop, regardless of history, and it simply has to happen.

I’m going to go off on an analogy here so you can see the absurdity of this….

As a military trained bomb technician, I was part of many exercises.  In one of them, my team got sent on a “satchel charge” on a fuel tank.  It was dead of night.  Our actually tools, weapons, were already depleted.  So, I go out on recon, find the satchel, take a quick “look” at it, and ask the instructor:

– “Is everything here just as I see it?”

Yes… “So, there are woods all around us, nothing else, no buildings, no people.”

No…  At that point I physically removed the charge from the tank and chunked it so far into the woods it wouldn’t hurt a thing.

Well, the instructor goes nuts, “you can’t do that!!!”  “Why not?”, I asked.  “This scenario is designed to be approached and solved in a very specific way,” he screamed.

Basically, he wanted me to go get a tool that wouldn’t work, take the time to try it so we can ENSURE it fails, THEN he would… what?  

I went and got the tool… found the satchel, finally… and yet, I was right… so, I set the tool down, opened the satchel by hand, and disarmed the device.  Yes, he was livid… but… I was RIGHT.

I used that analogy because the feds and Treasury are trying to use tools that have already failed, yet, we are told to WAIT and SEE if the fail.  In the meantime, another idea COULD work, but, the system won’t let it happen.

Geithner and Summers must go, and go now… or… we ARE so screwed.

Finally… nobody screamed that Gen. Patton couldn’t take Germany in a week.  He needed time.  But, if he had showed up, had his tanks running circles in the snow, his men in disarry, no goal, no plan… he wouldn’t have lasted long at all.