Timothy Geithner played the president and the country false by agitating for a pivot to deficit reduction while the economy remained in near-depression doldrums.
Could President Obama be insensitive enough, as well as just plain clueless enough to consider nominating Erskine Bowles to replace Geithner?
It does smell like a “plant,” you know, Bowles’s partisans floating a rumor as a strategy of wish fulfillment. On the other hand, Obama’s belief in Bowles’ s cred as a financial savant has been preposterous all along.
Dean Baker at nationofchange.org certainly has Bowles’s number: Bowles
“gives us a real trifecta. He used his position as co-chair of President Obama’s deficit commission to protect Wall Street. He pockets millions as part of a corrupt system of corporate governance that allows CEOs to rip-off the companies they run. And he wants to reduce Social Security benefits for seniors who are already living on the edge. In short, he is a true hero of the Washington establishment. ”
And Paul Krugman was right to sound the alarm again yesterday in the NY Times.