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Go Home Who Will Replace Tim Geithner?

JONATHAN CHAIT JUNE 30, 2011

Who Will Replace Tim Geithner?

BY JONATHAN CHAIT

With Tim Geithner apparently stepping down after the debt ceiling showdown, it's worth pondering just who the Obama administration could confirm to replace him. The almost-universal assumption is that the replacement will have to be moderate, or even right-of-center, left the Republicans filibuster his confirmation. Before we work within that assumption, though, it's worth putting some pressure on it. Obama could not appoint a Treasury secretary who is ideologically as liberal as Barack Obama. Someone with Obama's policy preferences could be elected president, but he can't be appointed Treasury Secretary by Obama. Sort of crazy, isn't it?

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19 comments

Why bother appointing someone because they don't bother the other side? Why not pick someone with the best credentials to hopefully pick up some confidence in the economy; and then, if knocked down, send someone else after that with exemplary credentials, and then someone else. What's wrong with that? We'll wait. Nobody's doing anything in Washington on the economy any way.

- Nusholtz

June 30, 2011 at 5:10pm

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Obama should seek political advantage with any replacement nominee, not try to get somebody confirmed.

- subterran

June 30, 2011 at 5:22pm

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Robert Reich. Now is the time to get him in there. The man's got a very clear handle on what needs to happen next. And the Republicans have mis-used the filibuster many times too many. Sure, it's needed. Sure, it's necessary. But I think the rules of when to use it, and how many times, and people getting away with saying "Well, *I* don't want to filibuster, but my FRIEND does, so I'll filibuster for him" should be changed.

- AllanL5

June 30, 2011 at 5:30pm

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Recess appointment. Hell, if the Senate goes out of session again, recess-appoint every vacant confirmable position. Enough with the games; if he's going to start talking tough, time to start acting tough to go with it.

- janus

June 30, 2011 at 5:32pm

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Good post, as succinct a description of the madness and debasement of Congress as there is. The Legislative branch is desperate for structural reform. I'm not so sure the filibuster is necessary AllanL5, in most cases it seems to be an extra-constitutional disaster. Maybe I could make an exception for certain wild judicial nominees, but Bork went down on a straight up vote.

- Pnaut

June 30, 2011 at 5:43pm

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I'm with Janus, recess appoint every vacant post.

- vips73

June 30, 2011 at 5:54pm

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I say shoot the moon. Pick a qualified, compatant choice and dare them to filibuster it. This is right up there with Supreme Court in being unblockable without mass media attention. Use the opportunity to pick a fight that reveals both the White House's and the Republicans' priorities.

- Crock1701

June 30, 2011 at 5:59pm

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I just hope it's someone who's not so finance/Wall Street centric.

- tmmats

June 30, 2011 at 6:05pm

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Robert Bernard Reich, nyet. He whined liked crazy after one term as Bill Clinton's Labor Secretary.

- liberalref

June 30, 2011 at 7:52pm

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Reich whined like crazy since he was locked in a closet and ignored by the Clintonites. They instead listened to the bankster clan who gave us a repeal of Glass-Steagall.

- tmmats

June 30, 2011 at 8:04pm

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Uh, ahem, tm, it was the bankster clan that gave us a balanced budget in the second Clinton term, the first one since 1969. And then another. And another after that, which W. blew to hell.

- liberalref

June 30, 2011 at 8:51pm

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Libref: and how did that work out for the nation, that balanced budget? Democrats spent great political capital to create it, with the deficit reduction act in 1993--which was probably 40 percent of the reason for the 1994 'revolution.' In their turn, the GOP, as you already noted, treated it as free money to piss away on tax cuts for the rich. Win to the right, it seems to me. Of course, those surpluses were only ever theoretical. What with emergency spending and whatnot, we never quite ran a surplus in the ACTUAL budget during the late nineties.

- Curran1

June 30, 2011 at 9:08pm

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Your comment is so incoherent it is amusing, C. You denigrate the balanced budgets of the 1990s but then you say they weren't actually balanced, without saying what you would like to have seen as policy in this arena. Cute, but not at all surprising. So we should have run deficits in those years, too? Your contention about emergency spending is phony, also. From 1995-1998, such spending did not even hit ten billion dollars in any of these years. By fiscal year 2000, the US federal budget surplus was some $230 billion. And what did we get from the surpluses? Gee, robust growth and increased productivity. Thanks for the amusing evening,. C.

- liberalref

June 30, 2011 at 9:44pm

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I didn't mention the balanced budget, it had nothing to do with Glass-Steagall. And the balanced budgets were also helped along with a great economy mainly due to a dot com bubble. Remember that? I sure do, I work in the tech sector and lived though the unraveling of it. It wasn't pretty and things never recovered fully from it in my business. The repeal of G/S was the set-up for the disaster we experienced the last 2-3 years. Even Bill Clinton now admits he was wrong in that regard; if he'd have listened to the Reichs of this world he would have made the disaster we're living through either milder or averted it outright. Deregulating banks had nothing to do with balanced budgets in any way. Repeal of G/S also had the 'side benefit' of making financial behemoths like GS and BofA too big to fail and amplified their clout in DC. It set up a structural boom/bailout financial cycle and for that the Clintonistas cannot be forgiven.

- tmmats

June 30, 2011 at 10:27pm

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And as for the balanced budgets and then surpluses, remember how GWB campaigned in 2000 in regards to that surplus? He promised to "return you hard earned money" in the form of massive tax cuts. The American public won't tolerate balanced budgets and surpluses for long. When (if?) this country starts to run a balanced budget and onward to a surplus to pay down that debt, as the teabaggers want (which ain't a bad idea), watch how quickly a teabagger republican will make sure that doesn't happen for long. They'll cut taxes like crazy, run up massive deficits and a Democrat get stuck with the blame. We're watching a re-run of that program right now.

- tmmats

June 30, 2011 at 10:34pm

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When will Democrats finally wise up and support ending the filibuster.

- RHSerlin

June 30, 2011 at 11:19pm

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I agree, fill every single vacant position with a recess appointment. Should have been done between sessions.

- roidubouloi

July 1, 2011 at 12:05am

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Good fucking riddance to Geithner. Hope he dies screaming. Pick a Wall Streeter who's made a fortune shuffling derivative paper around. Preferably someone from JP Morgan who now have a 90 Trillion notional derivative exposure. http://bigpicture.typepad.com/comments/2008/08/us-bank-derivat.html "Total net derivative exposure rated below BBB and below for JP Morgan currently stands at 35.4% while the same stood at 17.0% for Bear Stearns (February 2008) and 9.2% for Lehman (May 2008)." http://boombustblog.com/BoomBustBlog/An-Independent-Look-into-JP-Morgan.html It's worked so well in the past.

- IggyPop

July 1, 2011 at 6:13am

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Financial institution exposure to derivatives should be abolished by law immediately.

- roidubouloi

July 2, 2011 at 9:03am

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