Liberal Media Anxious To Get Geithner Confirmed
By Cliff Kincaid
January 22, 2009
If Obama Treasury Secretary nominee Timothy Geithner is so smart, why was he so dumb in handling his own taxes? Or perhaps he wasn't so dumb. Perhaps he thought he could get away with not paying his taxes. Either way, how is he fit to be Treasury Secretary, with jurisdiction over the IRS?
These are among the questions that still beg for answers after Geithner, President of the New York Federal Reserve Bank, spent a few hours on Wednesday at a confirmation hearing before the Senate Finance Committee.
But don't expect the media to try to get any definitive answers by demanding that Geithner return for more grilling.
As for the Congress, the same liberal politicians who have admittedly not exercised proper oversight over the Wall Street financial bailout are rushing Geithner's nomination through the Senate and a committee vote is scheduled for Thursday morning.
A Google search of stories about the hearing reveals headlines to the effect that merely questioning Geithner somehow undermines economic health and a market rebound. "Geithner Gets Grilled as Financial Sector Wobbles" is one of them.
Such coverage is designed to panic Senators into approving Geithner, who supposedly knows so much about so many important financial things that his confirmation alone will inspire market confidence and possibly turn the economic situation around. Some of this coverage comes from some of the same media outlets tied to firms getting some of the Wall Street bailout money.
The wildcard is the people. Several Senators on hand at Geithner's hearing said they had been contacted by their constituents, many of them upset at the thought that somebody with a tax history like Geithner's could even be considered for such a post.
At the hearing, Geithner repeated ad nauseam that he took responsibility for his mistakes. It was like a mantra. But he went beyond tax evasion to evading answers and doubletalk. It's too bad that the hearing, broadcast on C-SPAN, could not be seen by the American taxpayers on the other cable and broadcast networks. They would be totally shocked to learn that he is being seriously considered for any government position and hasn't yet been forced to withdraw his nomination.
Senator Jim Bunning, the outspoken conservative from Kentucky, didn't even get to the serious matter of Geithner's taxes before telling the committee that the nominee "has been involved in just about every flawed bailout action of the previous administration." Bunning also noted that Geithner in his official capacity had failed to cite China for the manipulation of its currency, which is one means by which the communist regime has gained a financial advantage over the United States.
As Accuracy in Media has argued in several columns, Geithner's main but unspoken "qualification" for the job is being a Wall Street insider with political connections to those who have brought the United States to the point of financial ruin and subservience to Communist China.
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