February 11, 2009

2/11: Geithner Strikes Out

Treasury Sec. Tim Geithner's speech about his plan to rescue the financial system did not go over well in the blogosphere. Most liberal bloggers reacted to his speech with confusion, describing it as "a punt" and calling his plan "undefined". Others were even more critical. It's clear that many liberal bloggers simply don't trust Geithner and view him as a Wall Street stooge. Conservative bloggers were also critical of Geithner's speech, decrying its lack of specifics and emphasizing the financial markets' negative reaction to it.

What else is happening in the blogosphere?

• Conservative bloggers (Hinderaker, Malkin, Lane) are blasting Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) for claiming that Americans "really don't care" about the various "porky amendments" in the stimulus bill.
• Liberal bloggers (Moulitsas, Sudbay) are criticizing TN Gov. Phil Bredesen for portraying his medical industry ties as an asset while discussing his candidacy for the HHS Sec. position.

GEITHNER: A Man Without A Plan

Geithner's plan to rescue the financial system was met with confusion by many liberal bloggers:

• TPM's Josh Marshall: "[Geithner's speech] was a punt. Perhaps they realized that the situation is too fluid and uncertain to come out with a definitive plan that brings us to the post-Economic Crisis promised land. And they may be right in that regard. But I can't help thinking that this is in some level a punt. Maybe they couldn't actually come to an agreement on what to do. So they came forward with this."
• The Washington Monthly's Steve Benen: "Geithner still hasn't actually outlined a concrete plan. He has some ideas, some beliefs, and a few good things to say about transparency, but the Treasury Secretary's speech was supposed to answer questions. Instead, it raised quite a few."
• The New York Times' Paul Krugman: "An old joke from my younger days: What do you get when you cross a Godfather with a deconstructionist? Someone who makes you an offer you can't understand. I found myself remembering that joke when trying to make sense of the Geithner financial rescue plan. It's really not clear what the plan means; there's an interpretation that makes it not too bad, but it's not clear if that's the right interpretation."
• Think Progress' Matthew Yglesias: "My read of the situation is that this isn't an epistemic problem where we don't know what the real plan is; rather the plan is just undefined. What was announced today leaves the door open to handling this the right way. Unfortunately, it also leaves the money open to the dread zombie bank scenario."

In a separate post, Yglesias wonders if Geithner's plan will lead to bank nationalization: "If I'm reading this correctly, Timothy Geithner's financial rescue plan actually might lead to bank nationalizations after all. [...] There's clearly a desire here to avoid nationalization. A strong desire. But if the situation in the banking sector is as bad as the skeptics tend to think, this plan is going to end up with the government owning a substantial share in at least some large banks."

The Atlantic's Andrew Sullivan: "I found Geithner's remarks unreassuring. If the goal was bold early action to grasp the nettle of the banks' insolvency, and to find a way to expose and control it, then this struck me as more muddling through, with better oversight. The more I read and talk to people who seem to know, the more it appears that we need to do what the Swedes did: take over and restructure the banks."

GEITHNER II: The Netroots Don't Trust Him

Other bloggers were more critical of Geithner's proposals:

• BooMan: "[A]s a public relations move, Geithner's performance yesterday was an epic failure. I think he should have waited until he had more to say before giving a speech and testifying before Congress. Most of all, I don't know anyone that thinks we can, or should, avoid nationalizing the banks. We should just bite the bullet and do it."
• Daily Kos' Markos Moulitsas: "Depressing. Wall Street and their enables in the Obama Administration (i.e. Geithner) are winning the battle to steal more of our money. At least Congress, in a bipartisan fashion, isn't giving the plan any respect. Only question is what they'll do about it."
• Open Left's David Sirota: "How can this be a $1.5 trillion plan, that doesn't ask Congress for any more money? Because the Treasury Secretary is effectively circumventing the legislative branch -- ie. popular democratic channels -- and relying on autocratic means of handing over more cash to Wall Street, most prominently, the Federal Reserve. The reason Geithner has chosen this path is because he knows that Congress would likely reflect the will of a very angry public and either reject or severely reform his bailout plan. So rather than allow public input into the plan via Congress, he's just going around democracy entirely."
• The Huffington Post's Cenk Uygur: "When I read Geithner defend this broken system and beg the companies for their cooperation as he gives them trillions of dollars of our money, I get a clear sign that he is not one of us. He is one of them. This is an inside job."
• dday: "I agree that nobody knows what the banks are worth, and a 'stress test' to see how they'll perform might be a good idea, but only if followed by wiping out those banks that have no chance of making it. But that's not what's happening. Geithner is keeping his friends whole while the rest of the nation starves. And there's not much rhyme or reason to it, either."

GEITHNER III: Wasn't He Supposed To Be Indispensable?

Conservative bloggers are also criticizing Geithner:

• Hot Air's Ed Morrissey: "Geithner stood on his podium and told investors that the federal government would give all of the toxic assets a soft landing. If he had a real plan to do that, investors would have been buoyed by that news and would have been encouraged to buy -- or at least not to sell. But all Geithner had was a bunch of slogans and concepts, and investors realized that The Indispensable Man hasn't got a clue. [...] Time to look for a better Treasury Secretary. Maybe this time, we can find one smart enough to successfully file his income taxes."
• Power Line's John Hinderaker: "The stock market tumbled more than four percent today in response to the perceived vagueness and inadequacy of the financial bailout program unveiled (sort of) by Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner. [...] The one thing we know for sure is that the thirteen-digit cost of TARP II will be borrowed and passed on to our children as part of the most extraordinary deficit spending binge in our history, with consequences that no one can foresee."
• NRO's David Malpass: "Geithner's 11 a.m. speech was unconvincing on the core issue of stopping the momentum-driven drain on bank capital. The plan probably won't cause new capital to move into the banking industry or existing bank stocks to go up (a prerequisite for increased bank lending.) [...] There weren't many specifics in Geithner's speech, nor a sense of urgency. I like the expansion of the Fed's Term Asset-Backed Securities Loan Facility (TALF) to $1 trillion, and the idea of the public-private partnership of up to $1 trillion to buy assets, but Washington is moving too slowly."
• The New Ledger's Francis Cianfrocca: "[I]f Obama's team really believe that this problem is a simple matter of building enough confidence among the world's investors to come back out and play, they're very wrong. And this is why I think Geithner looked and sounded so uncomfortable yesterday. He actually knows quite a bit about how banks and markets operate. And he knew he'd been sent out to sell a case for recovery that was about as compelling as when President Gerald Ford told us all to fight inflation by wearing WIN buttons."

Meanwhile, Michelle Malkin describes Geithner's plan as "socialism."

SCHUMER: Incurring The Rightroots' Wrath

Conservative bloggers are criticizing Schumer for saying that Americans "really don't care" about all of the "little, tiny, yes, porky amendments" in the stimulus bill. Many righty bloggers are urging their readers to call and email Schumer's office and complain about his remarks:

• Hinderaker: "It wouldn't be easy to identify the most overrated member of Congess, but Chuck Schumer probably gets my vote. Here, he admits that his party's 'stimulus' bill includes 'porky amendments,' but says that 'the American people really don't care.' If you do care, you could phone Schumer's office at 202-224-6542 or fax him at 202-228-3027, or email him here."
• Malkin: "Sixteen seconds packed with trademark liberal contempt, self-delusion, and oily arrogance. Easy to claim the American people 'don't care' when your voicemail and e-mailboxes are clogged with messages that will never be heard or read before the next rush to judgment takes place."
• RedState's Moe Lane: "Permit me to correct the Senior Senator for NY, who is, by the way, up for re-election next year: If there is a time where the American people 'really don't care' about pork and corruption, it's when times are good. Times are not good. [...] Not that he'd know. I don't think this guy has actually worked for a living in decades."
• Glenn Reynolds: "Here's Schumer's contact information."

Morrissey: "Schumer says no one cares about pork. The worst part? He's probably right."

BREDESEN: This Probably Isn't The Best Way To Defend Yourself...

Liberal bloggers are criticizing Bredesen for making the following remarks to the Wall Street Journal in defense of his qualifications for HHS Sec.:

"'Anybody who's got some real scars and experience is going to have their detractors,' the governor said [...]. 'People at the White House are smart enough to be able to assess that.' And he took a swipe at his opponents, saying that 'advocacy groups don't matter nearly as much as the pharmaceutical groups, the hospitals, the doctors' groups. There's a lot of very powerful interest groups that will play in this thing.'"

• Daily Kos' Markos Moulitsas: "[T]o Bredesen, patient groups don't matter. It's all about Big Pharma. This from the guy who actually cut health care services to people in his state. The HMOs want him bad -- he's (literally) one of them. Obama should resist."
• AMERICAblog's Joe Sudbay: "With that love of the health care industry (the very people who have created the health care debacle), Bredesen would have been the perfect pick for Secretary of HHS for George Bush, not Barack Obama. Bredesen made his fortune in the health insurance industry. He's an industry guy. [...] According to the WSJ, it sounds like [WH CoS] Rahm Emanuel is being lobbied by health care lobbyists to appoint Bredesen. That alone should end the discussion. If Obama is serious about health care reform -- and he says he is -- Obama has to say NO to Bredesen. And, importantly, Obama should make that clear to Rahm Emanuel."
• Ezra Klein: "Bredesen's chosen defense offers useful insight into his approach to health care issues. [...] This belief that industry support is the highest form of flattery isn't surprising. Bredesen himself comes from a health industry background. And, arguably, that gives him unique insight into their incentives and vulnerabilities. But he's presenting himself as the candidate of the health care industry rather than the candidate of those who think they need a secretary with the credibility to stand against the health care industry."

In a separate post, Klein notes that MoveOn.org has come out against Bredesen: "[I]t's hard not to wonder whether the advocacy isn't so caught up opposing the candidate they don't want that they're missing the opportunity to coalesce around the candidate they do want. In part, that may be because no other HHS candidate has strong or obvious support. Everyone seems to wish for [ex-WH CoS John] Podesta, expect [KS Gov. Kathleen] Sebelius, and be interested in [CT Rep. Rosa] DeLauro. But there's little advocacy around these candidates or discussion around their merits. When [ex-SD Sen. Tom] Daschle withdrew, as I reported at the time, no one had a Plan B. That was understandable. But it's perhaps a credit to his unique set of talents that in the week since, no one has come up with much of a Plan B, either."

Meanwhile, Moulitsas wants ex-DNC Chair Howard Dean as HHS Sec., since he would prefer that Sebelius run for the soon-to-be-vacant KS Senate seat instead of joining Obama's Cabinet.

THOUGHT OF THE DAY: The Same Old Story

The American Scene's Peter Suderman (h/t Ross Douthat):

"...I am worried, to an extent, about the way Hollywood is trending towards recycling its properties. Yes, Tinseltown has been peddling recycled goods for a while now, but increasingly, it seems as if most major projects are sequels, adaptations, or reboots. But I'm genuinely starting to wonder if we aren't headed toward a Hollywood that looks a lot more like the world of comics than the world of novels.

My worry is that rather than storytellers, the big Hollywood studios will become property owners, each with its own stable of recognizable icons, some brought from other mediums, some original to cinema: Transformers, Freddy, Jason, Spider-Man, Batman, James Bond, Jason Bourne, Robocop, Aliens, and on and on and on. My sense is that just as the major comic book publishers have largely spent their time and money recycling the same familiar characters for the last five decades or so, the big movie studios are trending toward a similar model. In the last few years, we've seen Die Hard, Rambo, Rocky, and Indiana Jones revived. We've watched Bond and Batman get total overhauls. A Robocop reboot is in the works. Kids shows from the 1980s seem to be hot properties: Transformers and Ninja Turtles have already made comebacks, G.I. Joe is coming this summer, and He-Man is on its way. And, of course, there's another Friday the 13th film hitting theaters this week.

Now, don't get me wrong. I love comic books, comic-book movies, and serialized genre fiction of all sorts. But it does strike me as sort of a shame that Hollywood, perhaps the greatest outlet for popular storytelling the last 100 years, now seems far less concerned with telling stories and far more concerned with retelling them."

LEST WE FORGET: Report: Guy On Bench Going To Town On Meatball Sub

From The Onion:

"ARLINGTON, VA -- According to witnesses at the scene, a man sitting on a park bench with an empty paper bag lying across his lap is at this moment giving it to a foot-long meatball sub like it's his job. 'God, look at him go,' said Matt Ponce, an Arlington resident who described the man's passion for the half-eaten sandwich as 'awe-inspiring' and 'disgusting.' 'He's practically making love to the thing. Man. Get a room.' As of press time, the man was still sitting on the bench, breathing heavily and staring at the empty space between his hands where the meatball sub could once be found."

Posted by Ian Faerstein at February 11, 2009 12:34 PM