Source: Treasury Secretary Snow resigns

[wicket]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060530/ap_on_go_pr_wh/white_house_shake_up

Treasury Secretary John Snow has resigned and will be replaced by Goldman Sachs Chairman Henry M. Paulson Jr., a senior administration official said Tuesday. It is the latest chapter of a White House shake-up aimed to revive President Bush's presidency.

Bush was to announce the changes in a White House ceremony later Tuesday.

Snow, the former head of railroad giant CSX Corp. who has a Ph.D. in economics, has been Treasury secretary since February 2003. His departure has been rumored for more than a year.

Paulson has been chairman of Goldman Sachs for more than eight years. It is considered one of the premier financial firms on Wall Street and has sent a number of its top executives to high positions in Washington.

Robert Rubin, one of Paulson's predecessors, served as Treasury secretary in the Clinton administration, and Jon Corzine, another Goldman Sachs chairman, served as a U.S. senator from New Jersey and is now governor of that state.

[Ian David]

1. He wanted to spend more time trickling-down on his family. n/t

[wicket]

2. LOL!

:D

[Starbucks Anarchist]

11. LMAO!

:toast:

[Deja Q]

3. But the economy is going great!!!!!! Why ditch such a good job?

:shrug:

[wavesofeuphoria]

4. "It is the latest chapter of a White House shake-up ...

aimed to revive President Bush's presidency."

This sentence makes it sound like this resignation .. and others of late .. are some how planned and designed .. by Bush to revive and redirect his administration. My take on it all is these are resignations forced by impending legal troubles and basic ship jumping. And didn't Bush just say last week .. Snow's resignation was news to him??


:shrug:

[tanyev]

14. Actually, I thought they had been looking for a replacement for Snow

for a long time. But they had a hard time finding someone stupid enough, I mean, qualified enough, to take the job.

[bleedingheart]

5. has he found another company to run into the ground?

[maine_raptor]

7. Yea "America"

Snow, though, did quite well running CSX.

[Canuckistanian]

21. Looting CSX, you mean

He took a moderately profitable company and ran it into the ground. And receiving a handsome salary while doing it.

Snow was also a champ when it came to executive compensation. In 12 years, as CSX shareholders experienced minimal returns, Snow took home at least $50 million. In 1996, he borrowed $25 million in company funds to buy stock. But when shares fell sharply, the company undid the loan in 2000. (So much for risk-taking.) Last year, when CSX underperformed all its railroad peers, he was paid $10.1 million. And he's not done. As the company's most recent proxy reads: "Mr. Snow will be provided with certain employee benefits and perquisites including office space and secretarial support, maintenance of country club memberships, executive physicals, discounts at The Greenbrier, and use of private aircraft for the remainder of his life."

http://www.slate.com/?id=2075270

[wordpix]

25. maybe he will "revive" CSX to take over the ports. "Revive" in quotes

because it appears he never has been able to revive anything except his paycheck--- for poor returns, no less.

[DoYouEverWonder]

6. Take the money and run

Another greedy Repug pig jumps off the sinking ship.

[MaineDem]

8. Bush to Nominate Goldman's Paulson to Replace Snow at Treasury

May 30 (Bloomberg) -- Henry Paulson, chief executive officer of Goldman Sachs Group Inc., will be nominated to succeed John Snow as U.S. Treasury Secretary, senior administration officials said.

Snow, the former chief executive officer of CSX Corp. became Treasury Secretary in February 2003 following the forced exit of Paul O'Neill. Snow traveled the country to promote President George W. Bush's efforts to cut taxes, win re-election and convince the public the economy was doing well.

While gaining praise for loyalty, Snow never won a role in Bush's inner circle, nor was his voice dominant in policy. Paulson is the latest Goldman executive to come to Washington: White House Chief of Staff Joshua Bolten worked at the firm in Europe and Robert Rubin, President Bill Clinton's longest- serving Treasury chief, was a former co-chairman of the bank.

``Once again the cream of Goldman finds their way into the Treasury's top spot,'' said Chris Rupkey, senior financial economist at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ Ltd. in New York. ``If Paulson is anything like his predecessor Rubin, the foreign exchange markets have absolutely nothing to worry about.''

http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000006&sid=aBMrB.XgoBRo&refer=home

[Ian David]

9. Snow wanted to spend more time raising interest rates on his family. n/t

[saltpoint]

10. LOL!

[rodeodance]

12. I want Robert Rubin to come back!

[BlueEyedSon]

22. me too

:(

[wordpix]

26. yes, Rubin was the BEST!

[jmowreader]

23. Robert Rubin's a nice man. Why do you hate him?

Anyone who steps into this job has got two problems facing him:

Problem 1: the economy is in quite possibly the worst shape it's ever been

Problem 2: the man at the helm, pResident George W. Bush, wants to make it worse

The economy can be fixed. The essential mechanics of the problem are not complex, and it has to do with wealth creation.

I am a big-time Taiichi Ohno fan. Ohno's the guy who created the Toyota Production System. Now, Ohno says there are only four wealth-creating industries: mining, forestry, agriculture and manufacturing. Ohno also says that of the four, the greatest potential for wealth creation is in the manufacturing industry. Ohno describes a "cycle of wealth creation"--the rate at which an industry starts "from scratch" and ends with a salable product. Mining created wealth one time--when the earth was created--and all that industry is doing is finding the created wealth. Forestry creates wealth at the rate that trees grow from seedlings to harvestable size--say, between 40 and 150 years per cycle, depending on the species being logged. Agriculture creates wealth at the rate that the crop you're harvesting goes from birth or planting to maturity--people who raise peas create wealth faster than people who raise cattle. But manufacturing creates wealth as fast as the product you make can be produced.

This means that, to have a vibrant economy, you simply must have manufacturing. Otherwise you're just dealing with subsistence farmers. Remember the old George Carlin joke that the function of the US military was to rush in, free some people and whip a little industry on them? (Which, as you will remember, is exactly what Douglas MacArthur did in Japan.) The "industry" we whip on them is always manufacturing. Always.

The problem facing any Treasury Secretary who wishes to actually fix the economy is that this most critical wealth generating industry has largely been outsourced.

The solution is to increase the nation's manufacturing base, and it's easily accomplished IF the president and the party running Congress isn't welded to the people most responsible for outsourcing. All we need to do is to require any company wishing to sell products to the government to produce a certain increasing percentage of its products in factories located within the United States. The optimum number is probably somewhere around 65 percent.

The government is the biggest single buyer in America, with the possible exception of Wal-Mart and I think the government is still bigger. And thanks to the IMPAC card, which is a credit card that allows government purchasers to just go downtown and buy small amounts of stuff instead of having to go through GSA channels to get a case of copier paper or a box of nails, a lot of government purchases are made at Wal-Mart. NO manufacturer in America is going to cut himself off from government sales by not meeting the targets.

Everyone reading this is going "yeah, right." And you're absolutely correct. As long as the Republicans hold the majority in Congress...as long as Bush inhabits the White House...this won't happen. They won't LET it happen. There's too much at stake for them--namely their seats.

Which means that there's no way to FIX the economy until the Repukes are out of power, so until we've got a government that's not Of The Corporations, By The Corporations and For The Corporations our friend Robert Rubin should not be returned to his post--we don't need to kill him.

[rodeodance]

13. recall last week when Bush said at the Blair news conference that he

knew nothing of Snow resigning?--this was after it had broken in the news.

[Cha]

15. bush likes to show

off his disingenousness..as I've said before bush is his own worst enemy.

[LuckyLib]

24. And that Snow was "doing a heckuva job." That should be our

first clue that the poor schmoe is on his way out!

[wordpix]

27. * does it again: "I don't know anything. " Whatta Chimp

[TheCowsCameHome]

16. It was easier to steal from CSX. I don't blame him.

And take Tony with you.

[peaches2003]

17. Cheney forgot to tell him

Bush probably wasn't lying Friday when he said Snow wasn't 'resigning', yet on Tuesday morning Snow's sucessor is in the Oval Office.

Cheney knew the Boy King was getting ready for a big holiday weekend and didn't want to spoil his fun by talking business. :beer:

[TriSec]

18. headed for Gotterdamerung?

So is it just me, or has the Bush "administration" taken on the air of the "last days of the Third Reich"....the way staff is leaving or being 'forced into retirement', and the increasingly questionable persons he's surrounding himself with...then of course there's the abject fantasy world aspect of this 'presidency'....it sure looks to me like it's starting to come apart.

The real question is, can we get a lifeboat, or is the whole country going to go down with him?

[DeepModem Mom]

19. Goldman Sachs chair, CEO Henry Paulson tapped to be Treasury chief

CNNMoney: Paulson tapped to be Treasury chief
Goldman Sachs chairman and CEO nominated by President Bush to succeed John Snow as Treasury Secretary.
May 30, 2006: 9:34 AM EDT

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) - President Bush nominated Goldman Sachs Chairman and CEO Henry Paulson to be the next U.S. Treasury Secretary Tuesday.

President Bush made the announcement at a White House ceremony, flanked by Paulson and current Treasury Secretary John Snow.

There had been speculation in the press, including a Saturday report in the New York Times, that Paulson wasn't interested in taking the job because of the limited role that Snow and his predecessor, Paul O'Neill, had in shaping administration policy.

Some other reports over the weekend had suggested that former Commerce Secretary Don Evans or Stephen Friedman, the president's former chief economic adviser, were leading contenders to replace Snow.

"I think getting Paulson is a bit of a coup for the Bush administration," said Jeoff Hall, the chief U.S. economist for Thomson Financial. "You've got enough academics at the Fed right now. You need someone with a little Wall Street credibility."...

http://money.cnn.com/2006/05/30/news/economy/snow_replacement/index.htm?cnn=yes

[fushuugi]

30. bush's top campaign donations...

involved 5 major financial institutions. out of the top 10 the 2nd-5th largest contributers:


Morgan Stanley Dean Witter & Co.: $486,125.00
Merrill Lynch & Co. Inc.: $455,904.00
UBS AG Inc: $368,900.00
Goldman Sachs Group: $295,950.00

and the 10th largest contributer:
Citigroup: $246,645.00


how does that labor ballad go?

"The banks are made of marble,
with a guard at every door,
and the vaults are stuffed with silver
that the workers sweated for."

[last1standing]

20. On the face of it this sounds like a good move.

The problem, of course, is that like every other capable person this misadministration as hired Paulson will never be a good fit in the corrupt atmosphere that is bushco*. Just like O'Neill, he soon be marginalized then blamed for the growing ills of our economy.

Paulson seems like a smart man - you have to wonder why he took this job.

[Dulcinea]

28. You mean they finally found another stooge?

Snow has been "on his way out" for months. They just couldn't find anyone to replace him.

[The_Casual_Observer]

29. Good riddance to that ineffective piece of shit.

Insider kiss ass bastard was totally incompetent and did nothing.

[geardaddy]

31. We'd be better off with Pat Paulson

[wicket]

32. kick

:kick: