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Ask Dr. Vodkapundit: Doesn’t Anyone Want a Job in the Treasury Dept.?
The withdrawals just keep on coming, and our president can't calm down the markets. Time to call in a therapist.
Today is an age of therapy — support groups, SRI medications, Oprah, a large and very strong cocktail at five o’clock sharp — and our president, for good or ill, is now our therapist-in-chief. Since at least as far back as FDR’s fireside chats, we’ve expected the president to calmly explain things to us, to whip inflation, to feel our pain, to pat us on the backs and remind us that we have nothing to fear but fear itself.
There are tons of perfectly good reasons to be uncomfortable with a national chief executive of supposedly limited and defined powers doing all these things. But as we’ve seen the last 50-some-odd days, there’s one incontestable reason to ask our commander-in-chief to also be our sob sister: President Obama is lousy at it, and it’s costing us trillions. That’s trillions, with a capital T.
Which rhymes with P, which stands for “paucity of proper personnel picks.”
For the third time in a week, a candidate for a major Department of the Treasury office has withdrawn from consideration. Thursday afternoon, H. Rodgin Cohen took his name back out of the hat because, as ABC News’s George Stephanopoulos reports, “an issue arose in the final stages of the vetting process.” And what issue might that have been? Tax evasion? Nannygate XVII? Murdering hobos for sport? We don’t know, because no one is saying. What we do know is, Cohen was supposed to serve as Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner’s right-hand (left-hand?) man, but will now be staying in the private sector.
(This is ironic, given that it was another Democratic president, Harry Truman, who once complained that he was going to find himself a one-armed economist who wouldn’t be able to say to him, “on the other hand…”)
It was late last week that Annette Nazareth withdrew from consideration for the same post, after “several interviews and vetting of her financial history,” according to Fox News. It would be unfair to note that when Nazareth served as the SEC’s director of the Division of Market Regulation, she tried and failed to catch Bernie Madoff at his pyramid games — because I can’t find any evidence that she ever actually tried.
Scant hours after Nazareth removed her thorny crown, Caroline Atkinson also withdrew her nomination to the almost-as-vital position of undersecretary for international affairs. The reason given was — surprise! — tax problems. It was at this point that the Telegraph’s Washington reporter, Toby Harnden, was forced to conclude that there were “signs of chaotic decision making and inadequate vetting” in the Obama administration.
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Stephen Green writes, broadcasts, and enjoys the occasional lovely adult beverage at the home he shares with his wife and son in Monument, Colorado.
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38 Comments
1. Marc Malone:This article is not up to your usual standards, Mr. Green. Shoulda had a couple more drinks before writing.
This subject is just ripe for your usual jokes. I still laugh at your “… Persian son of hamsters!” It’s a decent article, but not great. Sorry.
Mar 13, 2009 - 1:19 am 2. Marc Malone:It just occurred to me. Obama could reduce the unemployment figure noticeably by just filling all the positions at Treasury.
Mar 13, 2009 - 1:37 am 3. Meryl:Re obama, “Instead of using his moral authority to soothe the markets….”
Since his days on the primary trail, he has been a big talker, a liar and a racist.
So inquiring minds want to know….
….what moral authority would that be?
Mar 13, 2009 - 2:49 am 4. fear Obama:Acar worked under Kundra, Obama’s pick to coordinate federal computer systems. Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs would not say whether the White House knew the investigation was under way when it named Kundra last week, but called the case “a serious matter.”
This guy could be a great Treasury employee-
If AIG doesn’t payback,
He could hack money out of their computers.
Does he have my social security numbers?
Mar 13, 2009 - 2:58 am 5. Old Soldier:Who wants to deal with a 5-year tax audit for an anonymous job that pays less than these people can make in the private sector? Congress seems to want people who have the knowledge and experience to fix the banking industry – without any ties to those horrid people in the banking industry. These jobs are going to open a long time – eventually they will be filled with academics and bureaucrats.
Mar 13, 2009 - 4:54 am 6. Cog99:I’m thinking we might be better off if the jobs are not filled. Fewer fingers in the pie and all. We’d also be much better off if Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and Obambi just went on a very long cruise around the world on a very slow boat.
Mar 13, 2009 - 5:45 am 7. Parabellum:What’s the difference between Norm Abram and Barack 0bama?
Norm can assemble a cabinet.
Mar 13, 2009 - 5:58 am 8. agent bedhead:Does Dr. Vodkapundit have any SSRIs to help the citizens who just became even more depressed about the economy?
Mar 13, 2009 - 6:14 am 9. Ken Besig:All of you guys apparently still believe that Obama wants to rescue the American market economy or even to reform it when in fact he wants to destroy it as quickly as possible and remake it along European lines. Obama believes that wealthy Americans stole their wealth, and use the stock market to further illegally enrich themselves at the expense of the poor and the middle class, so what he is trying to do is separate the wealthy from their money by destroying the stock market and the banking system so his government can take that money and provide the poor with jobs, homes, and health care. Some of his nominees now realize that Obama’s game will impoverish them too, and they want no part of it. But unless the Congress and the Senate wake up soon and derail the Obama express, it is going run over every American household with disasterous results.
Mar 13, 2009 - 6:14 am 10. David Thomson:Only a fool would join the Obama administration’s treasury department. Anybody with a lick of sense realizes that the president is incompetent. Best to stay off the sinking ship.
Mar 13, 2009 - 6:27 am 11. J. Rockford:Why would any first-rate, professional and ethical person want a job in President Teleprompter’s Treasury Department? Talk about being set up for failure. Thanks to the left-wing Congress, the economy is already in shambles. The executive branch is amateur hour — and run by left-wing radicals. The Congress is run by left-wing crooks only interested in their own political power and personal wealth. Your boss cheated on his taxes. You would have virtually no ability to change things for the better. You don’t get paid anything compared to what a person of your ability could make in the private sector — unless you are unethical. And you get raked over the coals by those bumbling fools in Congress. It’s a wonder there are any first-rate people in government.
Mar 13, 2009 - 6:36 am 12. Kevin:This has been a true comedy of errors. All this talk about changing how DC does business. Ain’t nothing but words. He blew all his capital in nominations with Geithner, and Timmy has that deer in the lights look to show for it. They are basically getting screwed by their own tax system. They’ve gone through their first string choices as well as the second string. They have got to be on the third or fourth by now. Thank you to all the idiots who voted for this loser.
Mar 13, 2009 - 6:37 am 13. jjkrn:i’m buying more popcorn..this is a helluva movie…too bad i joined that 12 step fellowship..dang it…..Just for Today,,i will laugh my arse off at these incompetent boobs and marxists….have a great weekend ..that’s alllllll folks !!!!!!!!!
Mar 13, 2009 - 7:30 am 14. Chris:“And what issue might that have been? Tax evasion? Nannygate XVII? Murdering hobos for sport? We don’t know, because no one is saying.”
And notably, nobody is asking either. Any curiousity from our deciders (MSM)? No, they’re busy covering the Steele-Rush non-stories.
The plan procdeeds apace. Once the economy has been looted, step two, burning it down, can begin.
Mar 13, 2009 - 9:05 am 15. Craig:If the 17 positions under Tim Geithner remain open, I’m thinking (at an average salary of 150k) the taxpayer is saving about 2.5 million per annum.
We should have that $2 trillion deficit knocked out in no time!
Mar 13, 2009 - 9:24 am 16. Metz:All this represents the perfect opportunity for us to begin the process of balancing the budget. Judging by the fact that nobody who “appears” to be qualified (i.e. a Washington insider) seems to have been paying their taxes, I think we’ve found a gold mine.
We need to audit the members on Capital Hill, both House and Senate. Get volunteers from the private sector to come in, that way it is at no cost to the taxpayers (don’t we pay for enough already?). I’m sure you would no difficulty getting qualified persons in the form of CPA’s and Tax Attorneys to volunteer their time for this worthwhile endeavor. Then, once we’re done at the federal level, let’s move on to the state level.
My guess is, that once the announcement was made that this was actually going to happen, the amount of “Daschle” like amended returns would come flooding in…..from both sides of the aisle.
Mar 13, 2009 - 10:35 am 17. Blaine:A former coworker had a saying it isn’t a loss or a gain until you sell. If 40 to 45 percent has been destroyed in the last year and a half with ” no 9/11 in New York, no nuclear bomb going off in London or Beijing, no fleets of bombers destroying factories — there has not been any physical destruction of capital whatsoever” you to ask yourself if it was really wealth to begin with and not just a shell game waiting to be uncovered. I understand that “Most of the world’s riches now reside on the hard drives and financial statements of banks and other institutions” It is just bad luck that people got tired of “flipping” at this time but it had to happen.
Mar 13, 2009 - 11:27 am 18. Gloria:People in the world of high finance and banking are used to being winners and being with winners. As soon as Obama began to show unclarity of purpose, he demonstrated weakness. Winners shun weakness. As Obama’s incompetence as a manager increasingly shows itself, so too will the winners in finance, banking, and business shun him, to the great detriment of the country. Nobody wants to associate with a loser.
Mar 13, 2009 - 11:49 am 19. Pops in Vienna:Maybe it’s me…..but doesn’t the fact that we have a government agency that needs 17 political patronage deputies to function say something pretty sad about the US government?
I bet there’s a boat load of career people at Treasury who would do just fine in signing the paper work, attending meetings and developing strategic plans. The problem is that we have a president and a secretary of the treasury who won’t lead.
All the others are just deck hands who follow the policy voiced by the Messiah and Doogie Geitner. If they’d just appoint Volker Secretary of the Treasury he’d be able to git ‘er done without hiring a bunch of patronage sycophants.
Mar 13, 2009 - 12:53 pm 20. Duane Phinney:This is simple: Any honorable person with any ethics at all, will not touch the job. Once they find out what’s going on it’s thanks, but no thanks. So they have to settle for the not so honorable or ethical.
Mar 13, 2009 - 3:34 pm 21. Brent Ramsey:Geithner’s days are numbered. Advertised as a hotshot, he’s actually radioactive. Real reality is setting in slowly but surely. Once Geithner is gone, hopefully the Pres will realize this President stuff is for real and not just some reality show he is appearing in. One can only hope that the keystone cops act we have seen in the last 50 days will get somewhat better and our trip towards socialism and crushing debt and inflation will slow down. A saving grace is that being the chief Executive, these reality checks will just keep coming and coming and coming. Does Obama have the stamina and sense to learn from his mistakes or is he a true liberal idealogue? We shall see.
Mar 13, 2009 - 4:00 pm 22. Robohobo:Hey, I’ll go work at Treasury! I pay my taxes (scared not to). I did take an Econ 101 course in college so I know at least as much as they seem to in DC.
On the downside, I own guns and enjoy it, too.
Mar 13, 2009 - 4:34 pm 23. Roy Lofquist:I predict that the Toledo Mudhens will win the World Series this year. Sorry, 1950’s joke.
Mar 13, 2009 - 8:17 pm 24. Andrew_M_Garland:The careless, government gardener stuck his shovel into the ants nest by mistake. The ants first went crazy, then retreated into the nest. The gardener wanted to fix things, so he took his shovel and began to dig around the edges, uncover the soil, and see if he could help. He uncovered this and that, finding intricate rooms, and a lot of scurrying ants.
He tried moving the ants from places that weren’t damaged into the places that needed fixing, but the ants either scurried around or retreated deeper into the nest. Unfortunately, he collapsed a few more tunnels along the way. Most of the nest looked undamaged, and he couldn’t understand how the ants could be so stupid that they weren’t fixing the places that needed it.
He decided to read a bit about ants, and come back in a few hours to help them more.
———-
The Audacity to Do Nothing
The government isn’t helping the financial problem. It caused the problem through guarantees and housing policy, and now it is the continuing problem, preventing people who have the knowledge from acting without the risk of being stepped on.
We Guarantee It
Mar 13, 2009 - 9:51 pm 25. Peg C.:The government is guaranteeing us into poverty.
Ken Besig is right. And it’s obvious to me this is the back door to reparations on the grand scale the Teleprompter President and his Marxist friends have always lusted for.
Mar 14, 2009 - 3:32 am 26. Jabba the Tutt:You could say that 45% of the world’s wealth was destroyed or…. you could say that 45% of the world’s wealth was phony, baloney, worthless paper and numbers. That that’s how much the world’s government’s had inflated the money supply. And that it’s going to take a vicious recession, possibly depression the way Obama’s attempting to re-inflate the popped balloon to wring the crap out of the system.
The world wasn’t as wealthy as it thought it was. If you got out early, you made out like a bandit.
The question is, why are we going to leave “monetary policy”, ie legalized counterfeiting, in the hands of governments around the world. It’s like giving teenagers machine guns, a case of Jack Daniels and the keys to the Ferrari.
All thats going to happen, is that we’re going to repeat the process. End fiat money now.
Mar 14, 2009 - 4:38 am 27. tryptic:Remember how smug the Democrats were about how John McCain hadn’t properly vetted Gov. Palin? They were soooo much better at vetting than the McSame. So much more competent. Ready to lead from Day 1? (Or was that HRC … who can tell them apart?).
Well now look where we find ourselves. Until yesterday Barack is screaming that the sky is falling and that the fix will come from Treasury – but they cannot fill the top slots and are, at a minimum, weeks away (since they still need to find candidates willing to go through the initial vetting before the names are sent to the Senate for congressional vetting and approval). Utter incompetence.
I never want to hear a Democrat say that W was incompetent. Compared to Obama, W is a master mind. At least in W’s administration, our allies could find someone to talk to at Treasury … and remember he inherited a recession too.
Why the Democrats attack Rush for saying that he hopes Obama will fail is mystifying. Obama is ALREADY failing. Look no further than Treasury.
Mar 14, 2009 - 5:03 am 28. BJM:To mix a metaphor (it’s too early for a martini); the Dems are now hung on their own witch hunt petard.
It’s amusing to watch their appointments implode under the hostile vetting criteria they used against Bush appointees.
BDS, the comedic gift that keeps on giving.
Mar 14, 2009 - 9:17 am 29. Gary Ogletree:If the job pays enough to put up with living in DC I’ll take it. After all, having once been a small business owner, I have more practical experience where it’s needed than anyone in the Obama administration. And when we default on Treasury Bills my experience with bankruptcy will be golden. Like Dear Leader and The First Whiner, I’m all about service. And noting the quality of the vetting offered, I have assured my many skeletons they will easily pass the Obama standards. However, I do insist on being able to sleep through meetings without being disturbed and I want a plate of those famous White House french fries once a week. By the way, I’ll need a strong rope ladder I can throw out the window for a quick getaway. And I’d like to use an alias so I can preserve what’s left of my reputation while associating with this sordid crew. I don’t want the guys at the Low Life Tavern looking down on me. Yo! Timmy the Tax Cheat! Need a little help?
Mar 14, 2009 - 10:19 am 30. Gary Ogletree:I forgot to mention I have a BFA from UBC in Creative Writing. Gives me a good start on learning Creative Accounting I’m sure. And just so you know I’m a real live grad and not a “university denier” (clever, eh?) like nasty nasty Rush Limbaugh.
Mar 14, 2009 - 10:24 am 31. Marc Malone:#30 – “university denier” Funny!
Mar 14, 2009 - 12:20 pm 32. CJ:Agree with #17 Blaine and #26 Jabba. If 45% of the world’s wealth has suddenly evaporated — no wars, earthquakes, fires, volcanoes, or plagues — then it wasn’t really there in the first place. The age of bogus credit has imploded, and now we’re resetting to reality.
Mar 14, 2009 - 1:28 pm 33. Tristan Yates:I know of several people in the DC area right now that are very eager to work at Treasury and resolve the banking crisis and who have the experience to do so, and I personally would be willing to contribute any way I can. However, that’s exactly the problem – the people like me who are qualified actually want to fix things by taking out the bad banks and getting the taxpayer off the hook eliminating the public risk, not be part of some witless politically driven effort to prop up Citi, AIG, and a bunch of investment banks. And of course the “share the wealth” salary caps and DC taxes don’t help with recruiting either.
Mar 14, 2009 - 2:29 pm 34. Stepan:Obama has had problems vetting since day one of his famously slick campaign. Why is anyone surprised?
Wasn’t Rev. Jeremiah Wright the first one to go under the bus? But that wasn’t so much a case of not vetting Rev. Wright as much as it was just a bald-faced lie about disavowing his Marxist Liberation Theology.
Come to think of it, Rev. Wright would make an excellent nominee for Treasury. No tax problems (that we know about) and no problems what-so-ever with confiscating the property of guilty white folks and re-distributing it to his brethren.
That is Obama’s tax plan, right?
You go, Jeremiah!
Geithner’s replacement is waiting in the wings.
Mar 14, 2009 - 2:44 pm 35. Terry:Something occurred to me while reading this article. Citibank hasn’t been to the Treasury for almost a month and this past week they quietly told employees that they’re starting to make money. We watched the markets stage a nice rally this past week. Maybe things are starting to improve BECAUSE there isn’t anyone at Treasury!
Mar 15, 2009 - 5:15 am 36. Meryl:35 Terry. You’ve got a point. Apparently those empty jobs at Treasury are unnecessary. At the very list, the empty desks aren’t making things any worse than the empty suits would.
Mar 15, 2009 - 1:00 pm 37. Cheeky Wombat:Tom Clancy could fix this whole situation. When the president and all the cabinet crooks and Congress crooks were killed, Jack Ryan appointed competant, experienced people to the positions. Jack Ryan did not seek out the position in which he was thrust but he did what was in the best interest of this country. If only real life was like a novel.
Mar 15, 2009 - 9:34 pm 38. Marc Malone:#32 CJ – The wealth did exist. Some of it was indeed overstated. However, the thing is, the Stock Market looks forward, and it doesn’t look good for business. When the outlook for profits looks bad, stock prices go down. Value, and thus wealth, is destroyed, if it looks like a long-term problem.
The government is making the situation worse. “A depression is a mishandled recession.” Government has not yet fixed the underlying law problems. Propping up failed enterprises hurts. Bankrupting the nation is REALLY bad. Increasing taxes punishes. Cap-and-trade is horrible. So, wealth is destroyed, and it’s mostly the government’s doing. And it’s intentional. “A crisis is a terrible thing ot waste” – Rahm Emmanuel, WH Chief of Staff.
Mar 17, 2009 - 12:54 am