In his Times column the day Geithner announced the details of the administration’s bank-rescue plan, Krugman described his “despair” that Obama “has apparently settled on a financial plan that, in essence, assumes that banks are fundamentally sound and that bankers know what they’re doing. It’s as if the president were determined to confirm the growing perception that he and his economic team are out of touch, that their economic vision is clouded by excessively close ties to Wall Street.”

I believe I noted something similar. That part of our problem is that people move between Wall Street and government with considerable ease. You go into an Administartion as a mid level appointee, come out and go to Wall Street. A decade or so later you go back into government as a higher level appointee, then back out to Wall Street. Rinse and repeat. This is part of the problem, IMO, and it appears that Krugman shares this view (although he and I probably arrive at different policy conclusions).

Recommended to anyone who wishes to consider "confidence" and its role in the business cycle.

(I'm still working on the book itself, off and on. It's a little dry and textbook-like.)

1. I am also not sure if filling positions slowly but well is worse than quickly but poorly. Both Gregg and Richardson were qualified to be Commerce Sec. And yes, I was referring to Miers for the SC -- I have my doubts on her performance within the White House, but that would certainly go to specific politics.

2. I agree with what you said, but I strongly think Bush did not, preferring one source of info over all others. That reliance on a single source certainly was not shared by Hans Blix, who insisted on actual inspections of purported weapons sites (and whose failure to find anything in weeks of searching pushed me from being pro to anti Iraq War). And whether or not Clinton or Gore relied on that source, they did not find it persuasive enough to launch a war based on it.

3. Firing Rumsfeld and having Miers withdraw were not Bush's decisions so much as caving to overwhelming political pressure. We can argue whether the Surge was a significant change of policy or better directed tactics in support of the same policy, but that is for another day.

And please note that Derrick has still not responded to your comment, so _any_ response by me is light years ahead of his. You are criticizing him for not giving a detailed set of criticisms in a one sentence snark.

On the bailout side the numbers have been large, and disconcerting to us all, but sadly ...

By the end of December, global banks had written off about $1,000bn (€752bn, £699bn) in bad assets, approximately half of that in the US. Since the onset of the crisis, the writedown of assets in the US has exceeded the provision of new capital. Even the Geithner public-private partnership plan is not going to reverse the expected deterioration of capital ratios at sufficient speed and on sufficient scale. In Europe, new capital exceeded writedowns by a small amount, but on the recent projections I have seen, this trend could reverse sharply this year, unless governments introduce new recapitalisation plans.

That's from a scary piece at the Financial Times. I think the important phrase is "the writedown of assets in the US has exceeded the provision of new capital."

I can't help but feel that you are chewing the carpet a bit about "Obama" without really engaging what constitutes the middle course these days.

if Obama fails

LOL, If?

But what if [Krugman's] right, or part right? What if President Obama is squandering his only chance to step in and nationalize—well, maybe not nationalize, that loaded word—but restructure the banks before they collapse altogether?

Is the thread bitch that Obama should nationalize restructure the banks, and he isn't; that we should let them collapse and Obama's trying to prevent that (and therefore, he's incompetent, inexperienced, whatever for trying to preserve them)? Is that the complaint?

1. At least Bush did actuially hire people to fill the jobs, even if they didn't always do as well as anyone would have liked. Last I heard, 17 of 18 of the top Treasury positions are still unfilled. If Bush sucked, how would you rate Obama on hires? Remember Gregg? Richardson? I don't know, another seven or eight others who have had their nominations withdrawn, mostly because they didn't pay their taxes? It would seem that this should be a higher priority for a real executive, but maybe that's just me. but what do I know, I just run a small company. FWIW, harriet Miers was apparently successful for the job she held as the President's legal advisor. I believe you are referencing her nomination to be a Justice for the Supreme Court, which was withdrawn rather quickly and unceremoniously. Remember this for later.

2. All sources of information are biased. It is important for everyone to realize that. Good executives are accustomed to taking all infromationas data points. Everyone has to develop their own sense of what and who can be trusted. My understanding is that Bush relied on the same intel sources that Bill Clinton, Al Gore, Hans Blix, etc. all relied on concerning Iraq. Again, this sounds more like you didn't like his conclusions or policies than a substantive criticism.

3. You mean, like the Surge? Or replacing Rumsfeld? Or withdrawing Miers nomination? Nobody bats 1.000, but to say he never changed if demonstrably false.

Still, your repsonse was light years ahed of Derrick's.

"But do you have any substantive criticsm of him as an executive or is this just another inane polemic?"

Criticisms of W's executive decision making skills (apart from policies):

1. hiring of people who had no shred of qualification for the posts they were filling (Heckuva job Brownie and Harriet Miers are the most obvious examples, but many others).

2. reliance on biased sources of information over getting the full picture (such as stovepiping of intelligence on Iraq).

3. failure to change policies as events change (such as the tax cut originally designed for rapidly growing economy became one to bring country out of recession).

his “despair” that Obama “has apparently settled on a financial plan that, in essence, assumes that banks are fundamentally sound and that bankers know what they’re doing.

Some of us believe bankers know more about what they're doing than government officials. Perhaps Obama has reason to agree.

In one of the points in that link, "bipartisanship" , "middle of the road", and "progressivism " were labeled as the most alarming single danger to the American political system.

We are in trouble as the nation today to the exact agreed to which we've ignored that warning.

FWIW, I do find his policies pretty conventional.

Centrist, conventional, we got a whole 'nother vocaulary being developed here.

Yeah, because mucho executive experience helped out W so well.

We get it, you didn't like W's policies. But do you have any substantive criticsm of him as an executive or is this just another inane polemic? Or are you unable to distinguish between what you regard as bad decisions and an inability to implement any decisions, good or bad?

Obama has zero experience as an executive (not counting time with the educational fund he chaired but accomplished little in the way of educational improvement) so what could one expect him to do.

Yeah, because mucho executive experience helped out W so well.