The Obama Dream Team by Mike Whitney (An article critical of Obama's appointees)

[LBJDemocrat]

"Timothy Geithner and Lawrence Summers were central figures in the bubble-driven growth and deregulation mania of the last decade. Their influence factored heavily into the speculation that was brought on by low interest rates, easy credit and massive leverage; the lethal combo that created the present crisis. "

http://counterpunch.com/whitney11282008.html

[cali]

1. Counterpunch- the worldnut daily of the left.

[NYCGirl]

10. WorldNut Daily is actually better than Counterpunch in one way;

They only smear the opposing party, not their own.

[Captain Hilts]

2. The '90s had different problems that called for different solutions.

These folks have learning curves.

[gravity]

3. Are you blaming Clinton for this mess now?

[emulatorloo]

4. perfectly said, Cali -- at one point I was almost sure counterpunch was a Rove Psy-Op group.

One of my more paranoid days back in 2004.

[polichick]

5. Well, Obama's choices seem to have an awful lot to do with experience...

...but imo the cabinet (what we know so far of the economic and nat'l security posts) would be frightening without Barack at the top. Advisers are another story.

[LBJDemocrat]

6. Agreed. nt

[happychatter]

7. Obama to Economic Advisors, day one:

"Well folks, you know MY position on the relationship of deregulation to the current crisis.

You know that your own economic philosophy may well be the primary contributing factor, to what may become a Global Depression, in my opinion.

What do you suggest we do now, TO UN-FUCK WHAT YOU HAVE DONE?"

[LWolf]

8. Summers:

<snip>

Summers is best known for the sexism controversy which cost him the presidency of Harvard in 2006. But fifteen years earlier he gained infamy as an advocate of African genocide and environmental racism, thanks to a confidential World Bank memo he signed when he was the institution's senior vice president and chief economist: "I think the economic logic behind dumping a load of toxic waste in the lowest-wage country is impeccable and we should face up to that... I've always thought that underpopulated countries in Africa are vastly under-polluted, their air quality is vastly inefficiently low..."

After all, Summers continued, inhabitants of low-income countries typically die before the age at which they would begin suffering prostate cancer associated with toxic dumping. And in any event, using marginal productivity of labour as a measure, low-income Africans are not worth very much anyhow. Nor are African's aesthetic concerns with air pollution likely to be as substantive as they are for wealthy northerners.

Such arguments were said by Summers to be made in an 'ironic' way (and in his defense, he may have simply plagiarized the memo from a colleague, Lant Pritchett). Yet their internal logic was pursued with a vengeance by the World Bank and IMF long after Summers moved over to the Clinton Treasury Department, where in 1999 he insisted that Joseph Stiglitz be fired by Bank president James Wolfensohn, for speaking out against the impeccable economic logic of the Washington Consensus.

http://www.africafocus.org/docs08/usaf0811.php

[RollWithIt]

9. Ummm, Timothy Geithner was one of the first people in the Fed to warn about the credit crisis...

years ago. This article is hogwash.