Larry Summers Out as Obama's Treasury Pick?

Posted by Matt Stoller, Open Left at 9:45 AM on November 14, 2008.

Victoria McGrane and Lisa Lerer from the Politico are reporting that Larry Summers is on the outs with the transition team.

The incident would likely make Summers' Senate confirmation a rocky proposition, especially since women's groups and liberal bloggers have already unleashed fierce opposition to him.

So far, our petition has around 6000 names on it, and several Facebook groups have emerged to protest his possible selection.  Women's groups have released a list of names for good candidates.

For Treasury secretary, Gandy said she suggested Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. Chairwoman Shelia Bair; Alice Rivlin, the first director of the Congressional Budget Office and expert on urban issues as well as fiscal, monetary and social policy; former Commodity Futures Trading Commission chairwoman Brooksley Born, who tried to regulate credit default swaps but was blocked by Summers, former Clinton Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin and former Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan.

I don't know Rivlin, but Bair and Born would seem like excellent choices.  Dean Baker likes Bair, who is a Republican and has done a good job at the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation.  Brooksley Born is another one who fought aggressively in the 1990s to regulate the derivatives market, only to be undermined by the good old boys of Rubin, Summers, and Greenspan and their industry allies.  Any of these candidates would send a strong message that business as usual is over.

... Adding that Summers has a background that is just ripe for embarrassing Obama during confirmation hearings, not just in terms of his role deregulating financial markets in the 1990s or associating with people like Ken Lay of Enron, and disparaging women.  Larry Summers before Republican Senators for a hearing would be like letting cats into a catnip factory.