The week begins exactly where last week came to an end — the financial crisis.  Barack Obama is set to take the stage on Tuesday evening giving a Press Conference regarding the current financial meltdown that will air in primetime.   Jonathon Capehart, in a curiously on the point op-ed states,  ”Obama must teach the people what is going on in the financial sector.”  Capehart goes on to say that he should use all those graphs, pointers, clipboards, and slides that simply annoyed the heck out of us in High School. Be that as it may, with immense media chatter over a failed 60 Minutes interview, and continued questioning of Tim Geithner, Obama must show that he knows where the meat is on the bare bones of financial reality.    

Gen Y:  The next “Greatest Generation?” — Sara Libby
NBC’s Chuck Todd Gathers Citizen Questions For Obama Presser — The Nation 
The Geithner Paradox — Damned If You Do … — David Paul Kuhn 
The Crisis Scorecard:  Winners and Losers — Richard Reeves  
When Did The Economy Really Fall Off a Cliff – Jean Strouse 
My Plan For Bad Bank Assets — Timothy Geithner  
Neither a Hedgehog Nor a Fox — Peggy Noonan 
Obama’s Teachable Moment II — Jonathon Capehart

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WASHINGTON – New York Federal Reserve Bank President Timothy Geithner won confirmation Monday as President Barack Obama’s treasury secretary despite personal tax lapses that turned more than a third of the Senate against him. Obama immediately put him to work fixing an economy in “dangerous jeopardy.”

“We can’t waste a day,” Obama said, standing beside Geithner as he was sworn into office by Vice President Joe Biden.

The Senate voted 60-34 to put Geithner in charge of the administration’s economic team as it races to halt the worst financial slide in generations. The swearing-in followed less than an hour later, the administration seeking to emphasize that it was wasting no time in trying to address the financial crisis.

Obama said there had been a “devastating loss in trust and confidence” in the U.S. economy.

In his remarks, Geithner said the new administration would work first to stabilize the financial system and get the economy growing again and then would move to reform the system.

“We are at a point of maximum challenge for our economy and our country,” Geithner said to a standing-room only audience in Treasury Department’s ornate Cash Room. On hand were Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and former Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers, now director of Obama’s National Economic Council.

Referring to Geithner’s tax problems, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said Geithner had made amends — he has paid the taxes and penalties — and possessed the talent needed to steer the nation out of the crisis.

Geithner, 47, served as undersecretary of the treasury for international affairs during the Clinton administration. As president of the New York Federal Reserve Bank, he’s been a key player in the government’s response to collapsing financial institutions and the housing and credit markets since last summer.

The ambivalence dogging lawmakers was reflected in the fact that a third of the chamber voted against Geithner, in large part because of his failure to pay all his taxes on income received from the International Monetary Fund in 2001 and in three subsequent years.

Ten Republicans overlooked that matter and voted for confirmation. One Republican, Sen. Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, told reporters earlier in the day that he would vote yes, only to change his mind and vote no.

Three Democrats and one independent voted against Geithner’s confirmation, including Sen. Robert C. Byrd, D-W.Va., the longest-serving senator in history.

“Had he not been nominated for treasury secretary, it’s doubtful that he would have ever paid these taxes,” Byrd said in a statement.

For the prevailing majority, the real reason for Geithner’s likely confirmation appears to be less a matter of bipartisan cooperation than political survival. Lawmakers of all stripes are eager to set the economy in the right direction long before voters judge their progress in the 2010 midterm elections.

“People make mistakes and commit oversights,” said Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah. “Even the most intelligent and gifted — two adjectives that certainly apply to Mr. Geithner — make errors in their financial dealings.”

Even so, not everyone was convinced that the need for a speedy confirmation should trump concerns about the candidate. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, didn’t buy Geithner’s contention that he skipped paying some taxes because he was confused by the complexities of the tax code.

“They were described by the nominee himself as ‘careless mistakes,’” Collins said in prepared remarks. “It has become clear to me that this is not merely a matter of complexity leading to mistakes, but of inexcusable negligence.”

Sen. Mike Enzi, R-Wyo., agreed and noted that his is one of the few voices of dissent.

“Nominees for positions that do not oversee tax reporting and collection have been forced to withdraw their nomination for more minor offenses. They have been ridden out of town on a verbal rail,” Enzi told the Senate. “The fact that we’re in a global economic crisis is not a reason to overlook these errors.”

“The Senate,” he scolded, “is not supposed to be a group of ‘yes’ men.”

It wasn’t. Democratic Sen. Tom Harkin of Iowa lined up against the nominee, asking how someone of Geithner’s “financial sophistication” could innocently not pay the taxes and then head up the agency that oversees the IRS.

“How can Mr. Geithner speak with any credibility or authority?” Harkin said.

Specter earlier in the day had told WHP radio in Harrisburg, Pa., that he planned to vote for confirmation, only to change his mind and vote no later in the evening.

“I’m prepared to back Obama on this issue,” Specter had said in the interview. “The economic situation is so tense right now and I don’t want see us go back to square one and wait several weeks or longer for the process to bring in a new treasury secretary.”

The 10 Republicans who voted yes were Sens. Bob Corker of Tennessee, John Cornyn of Texas, Mike Crapo of Idaho, John Ensign of Nevada, Lindsey Graham ofSouth Carolina, Judd Gregg of New Hampshire, Hatch of Utah, Richard Shelby of Alabama, Olympia Snowe of Maine and George Voinovich of Ohio.

The Democrats voting no were Sens. Byrd, Russell Feingold of Wisconsin and Harkin of Iowa. Also voting no was Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., who caucuses with Democrats.

Sens. Kit Bond, R-Mo., Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass. and Ron Wyden, D-Ore., were absent. Senate seats representing Minnesota and New York are vacant.

The Senate Finance Committee approved Geithner’s confirmation in an 18-5 vote last week.

Laurie Kellman, AP

——-

It appears that Olympia Snowe will be one of the Republicans to watch in the Senate, who may prove to create a fillibuster proof Senate.

– AC

Source:  Yahoo 

Update:

Video of Geithner being sworn in as US Treasury Secretary

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WASHINGTON – A Capitol Hill grilling is likely for Timothy Geithner,President-elect Barack Obama‘s pick to head the Treasury Department, after public revelations he failed to pay $34,000 in taxes several years ago.

Senate Democrats are pressing to schedule a quick confirmation hearing for Geithner on Friday, hoping to tee up swift approval of his nomination on Inauguration Day. But newly released information about the tax goofs by Geithner, regarded as a brilliant financial markets specialist well-positioned to deal with the nation’s considerable economic problems, could complicate the process.

Republicans have yet to sign off on expediting the hearing, although senior Democrats expressed confidence that the disclosures would do little to slow Geithner’s path to confirmation. At least one Republican,Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah, said he had “no problem” with Geithner.

Still, the disclosures virtually guarantee a tough hearing for Geithner before the Senate Finance Committee, which is considering his nomination.

Geithner failed to pay self-employment taxes for money he earned from 2001 to 2004 while working for the International Monetary Fund, according to materials released by the committee Tuesday.

He paid some of the taxes in 2006, after an IRS audit discovered the discrepancy for taxes paid in 2003 and 2004. But it wasn’t until much later — days before Obama tapped him to head Treasury late last year — that Geithner paid back most of the taxes, incurred in 2001 and 2002. He did so after Obama’s transition team found that Geithner had made the same tax mistake his first two years at the IMF as the one the IRS found he made during his last two years there.

The panel’s report also noted that Geithner briefly employed a housekeeper in 2005 whose legal immigrant work status had lapsed.

Taken together, the disclosures cast a cloud over what otherwise had appeared to be a smooth road to confirmation for Geithner. Obama’s transition team told Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., and senior Republican Charles E. Grassley of Iowa of the tax problems in early December, but most rank-and-file members of the panel only learned of them recently.

Some heard about them for the first time at a closed-door committee meeting on Capitol Hill on Tuesday afternoon. Later, Geithner joined the huddle to defend himself and address questions about what he and Obama’s team called a mistake.

“These errors were not intentional; they were honest mistakes,” Baucus said after the session.

Grassley, who pressed for the irregularities to be made public, hasn’t said whether he considers them grounds for opposing Geithner’s nomination.

Grassley regards the disclosure as “serious, and whether or not it’s disqualifying is to be determined,” said Jill Kozeny, a spokeswoman.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., dismissed the events as “a few little hiccups,” and said he was “not concerned at all” about the impact.

Obama reiterated his support for Geithner.

“He’s dedicated his career to our country and served with honor, intelligence and distinction,” incoming White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said. “That service should not be tarnished by honest mistakes, which, upon learning of them, he quickly addressed.”

Obama’s team says his mistake was a common one for people hired by international organizations and foreign embassies that don’t pay the employer share of Social Security taxes. The IRS estimated in 2006 that as many as half those employees had made tax-filing mistakes, and offered a group settlement to let them correct the errors.

But some tax experts said the problem is not that common.

Tom Ochsenschlager, vice president of tax for the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, said it would be difficult for someone preparing a tax return for a self-employed person to skip the Social Security and Medicare tax lines.

“It’s such a basic mistake that I kind of wonder if we know all the facts,” Ochsenschlager said.

___

Associated Press writers Nedra Pickler, Andrew Taylor and Brett J. Blackledge in Washington and Eileen AJ Connelly in New York contributed to this report.

Source:  Yahoo News

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