Plouffe for DNC Chair & Anyone But Summers for Treasury

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The New York Times, which helped serve up the Iraq War, shilling as early as the summer before, is now irritated because someone had the sense to publish a spoof edition suggesting some common sense outcomes to those who might wish to see some human progress?

Transition Roundup SOURCE

All about Robert Gibbs SOURCE

When will people wake up and see that the crisis we are in is about the design and structure of suburbia and exurbia, in other words about the disfunctional nature of metrosprawl and the the uselessness of making the private automobile the key to our economic future? Maybe when we see enough malls close their doors, we'll stop propping up what won't work longterm and begin a bold new approach to both transportation and human settlements. Detroit needs to start making new buses, free, advertising supported transport on our interstates. We need to get out of the private car mentality. We need to get out of the idea of detached dwellings that will never pass ecological muster. Gulp. All that? Yup. SOURCE

Does bailout need a makeover? DUH SOURCE

Plouffe for DNC Chair & Anyone But Summers for Treasury

Today I am violating my own general rule about holding back on who I think should be in the Cabinet.

If you scroll down you will access a pretty tough treatment of Larry Summers and a strong suggestion that he might be a major risk if appointed to Treasury and entrusted with an already flawed bailout effort.

I am hardly doing this "from the left".

Like some of Summers' most vocal admirers, I am more a centrist when it comes to seeking political solutions.

I simply believe Summers is another Harvard appointment waiting to go up in smoke. And this is unnecessary. There are excellent Treasury choices without courting a fight.

My second venture into personnel matters is related to the admirable David Plouffe. Enjoy.

Plouffe Should Reconsider DNC Option SOURCE

I was about to do a nice piece on why David Plouffe would be an ideal successor to Howard Dean at the Democratic National Committee. My thinking went this way. I was on the Obama Blog and there is a campaign underway to raise money in $250 chunks for the DNC.

My immediate thought was that if David Plouffe was running the DNC there would be no problem. We would know the funds were in good hands.

Then I googled "Plouffe for DNC" and David Corn of MoJo has a piece already up at Huffington Post which starts off with an update indicating that Plouffe has indicated he will nto be going to DNC. Corn's argument as to why he should is well worth a look. I know there is a certain presumption in telling the Obama Movement what it should do. But I think in this case there is no harm in at least attempting to underline a pretty obvious suggestion.

But Job One of the new DNC chair is to win the 2010 congressional elections as a prelude to winning reelection for in 2012. The party doesn't need a visionary or public leader in the position. Obama can handle those tasks. (The party on the outs is the one that requires a posterboy or postergirl who is good on television.) The Democrats need an uber-operative who can simultaneously oversee scores of critical House and Senate races, supervise the early reelection effort, and chart out the overall mission of advancing the party's interests across the country. The next DNC chair should also know a thing or two about fundraising and be able to transform the party into the receptacle for all the grassroots energy and passion that poured into the Obama campaign. Who better than Plouffe to do all this?

And if thuth be known, Plouffe is excellent on TV, reminiscent of the Kennedy brothers.

While We're At It, Please Avoid A Summers Debacle SOURCE

Mark Ames of the Nation has added some additional arguments to my list of reasons for opposing the possible selection of Larry Summers to be the head of Treasury, a job which would put the entire economy in his court. My past arguments have referenced individual behavior and involvement in the decisions which, during his years in the Clinton administration, resulted in Reaganesque actions dismantling regulatory laws that had been in force since the Depression.

Ames informs us that Summers, brilliant though he is conceded to be, managed to help double the Lithuanian suicide rate with disastrous economic consultation in that country and became embroiled in a crony-laden disaster relating to the ruination of Russia's economy. Leading to the following conclusion:

The bailout, as currently implemented, threatens to devastate America's economy much as Russia's and Lithuania's were devastated before. The idea that this is exactly the right time and place to put Larry Summers in charge of our economy's future is so frightening that it makes the Sarah Palin vice presidential choice seem almost quaint by comparison. Let's hope the rumors are wrong.

Barack has already warned us that there will be bumps and that he is not perfect. But in the case of not appointing Summers, we have not even enumerated the possibility that gaffes not even referenced here (the celebrated argument against the female gender which resulted in his expulsion as Harvard President, etc.) could result in a field day for Republicans already smarting from electoral defeat.

Such a hearing to defend Summers could lose months of good will and set back the Obama Movement big time.

If not Volcker there are other Treasury choices who have much better track records and no history of conspicuous failure.

Al Gore's Five Point Mandate for Getting off The Dime SOURCE

First, the new president and the new Congress should offer large-scale investment incentives for the construction of concentrated solar thermal plants in the Southwestern deserts, wind farms in the corridor stretching from Texas to the Dakotas and advanced plants in geothermal hot spots that could produce large amounts of electricity.

Second, we should begin the planning and construction of a unified national smart grid for the transport of renewable electricity from the rural places where it is mostly generated to the cities where it is mostly used. The cost of this modern grid -- $400 billion over 10 years -- pales in comparison with the annual loss to American business of $120 billion due to the cascading failures that are endemic to our current balkanized and antiquated electricity lines.

Third, we should help America's automobile industry (not only the Big Three but the innovative new startup companies as well) to convert quickly to plug-in hybrids that can run on the renewable electricity that will be available as the rest of this plan matures. In combination with the unified grid, a nationwide fleet of plug-in hybrids would also help to solve the problem of electricity storage.

With this sort of grid, cars could be charged during off-peak energy-use hours; during peak hours, when fewer cars are on the road, they could contribute their electricity back into the national grid.

Fourth, we should embark on a nationwide effort to retrofit buildings with better insulation and energy-efficient windows and lighting. This initiative should be coupled with the proposal in Congress to help Americans who are burdened by mortgages that exceed the value of their homes.

Fifth, the United States should lead the way by putting a price on carbon here at home, and by leading the world's efforts to replace the Kyoto treaty next year in Copenhagen with a more effective treaty that caps global carbon dioxide emissions and encourages nations to invest together in efficient ways to reduce global warming pollution quickly, including by sharply reducing deforestation.

Of course, the best way to secure a global agreement to safeguard our future is by re-establishing the United States as the country with the moral and political authority to lead the world toward a solution.

Gore is wrong on perpetuating the private automobile, green or not.

obama
larry summers
al gore
david plouffe

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