Geithner isn't a failure. He's been very loyal to Goldman Sachs

[Ardent15]

And for Geithner, Goldman Sachs' fortunes are all that matter.

I think Obama is a good man, but he has surrounded himself with the people who are to blame for the catastrophe in the first place. So it's not that I doubt Obama as much as I doubt the people around him.

[AllentownJake]

1. That is one theory

"Those Obama fans who are disappointed keep looking for explanations. Is he too impressed by the elite he met in Cambridge, too eager to split the difference between left and right, too willing to compromise? As he pursues legislation, why does he keep deferring to others — whether to his party’s Congressional leaders or the Congressional Budget Office or to this month’s acting president, Olympia Snowe? Why doesn’t he ever draw a line in the sand? “We know Obama has good values,” Jeff Madrick said to me last week, “but we don’t know if he has convictions.”

What we also know is that if Teddy Roosevelt palled around with John D. Rockefeller as today’s political class does with Wall Street’s titans and lobbyists, the tentacles of the original octopus would still be coiled tightly around America’s neck."

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/18/opinion/18rich.html?_r=1

[pscot]

9. The French used to say the same thing

about Louis the 14th. Oh, the king is a good man. If only he knew what his ministers are up to.

[FrenchieCat]

2. At the current time, there is no failure in reference to

the recovery of the economy....other than the failure for some to understand
that recovery doesn't happen in a few month's time....
It never has, and it never will.

Now if you want to discuss your failures....
well, those are much clearer than trying to count the hairs on an elephant's back.

[Hannah Bell]

8. This recession began 12/07, & is the longest post-war recession.

So far, unemployment is still rising.

[tbyg52]

3. >>it's not that I doubt Obama as much as I doubt the people around him.

Well, he's the one who surrounded himself with them.....

[AndyA]

4. I really do have to question Obama's judgment and motives when he does

surround himself by the very same people responsible for the mess we're enduring today.

What are his motives for doing such a thing? Isn't this entrusting the proverbial liquor cabinet key to the resident alcoholic?

This and the lack of transparency we were promised, the lazy attitude toward addressing the discrimination of gay people, and the reluctance to prosecute Bushco are tarnishing Obama's Presidency. He still has time to correct these things, but the clock is ticking...

[rhett o rick]

5. I have a sinking feeling that he cant do much about it. nt

[ipaint]

6. Obama is extremely intelligent

and geithner is doing exactly the job he was hired to do.

[rhett o rick]

10. This has nothing to do with his intelligence. The banking industry is so powerful

that the president may be powerless to fight them.

[bertman]

11. Not just banking. Don't forget the Insurance industry, Big Pharma and the Military-

Industrial-Intelligence-Corporate Complex.

Presidents since JFK are mostly politicians who hope to do some good while not pissing off their puppetmasters so much that they use the "Kennedy solution".

Of course, doing "some good" has different meanings to different people, for example Dubya's doing some good would be very different from President Obama's.

[tbyg52]

7. He's not the one really running things, that's true. nt

[Lilith Velkor]

12. Yyyup. n/t