RUSH: We have a montage here. Remember Charlie Rose and Tom Brokaw shortly before the election talking about Obama, both admitting they knew nothing about him. They didn’t know who he was, what books he had read, which prompted me to say to Brokaw, ‘Well, dispatch a reporter to find out. I mean you are NBC. That’s what journalists do. Do you realize how stupid you sound Tom sitting on the television saying you don’t know anything about the guy that’s going to be president?’ Charlie Rose interviewed David Faber of CNBC. This is a montage of them discussing the bomb-out performance yesterday of Timothy Geithner laying out his non-plan to rescue the banks.
ROSE: What do you think of Geithner?
FABER: People wanted more; they want details of how this is all going to work.
ROSE: And the reason they didn’t get more?
FABER: I don’t think they know what they’re going to do yet exactly.
ROSE: That’s my impression.
FABER: But then it raises the question, well, then why now?
ROSE: Exactly.
FABER: It didn’t get off to a particularly got a start under Geithner.
ROSE: They had to know what the stakes were.
FABER: I know. I agree. You’d think that there — I keep waiting.
ROSE: The perception — the perception game is that play.
FABER: Perhaps, Charlie, you have a better sense for why they had or felt the pressure they did to present something today.
ROSE: There’s no easy, perfect answer, but you’ve gotta do something.
FABER: Yeah, that’s true. I suppose that’s true. This is a painful exercise.
RUSH: Yeah, it was a painful sound bite to have to listen to you, it was a painful montage. That’s David Faber of CNBC and Charlie Rose trying to cover up for their obvious disappointment at how horrible Geithner was. Here’s David ‘Rodham’ Gergen, Anderson Cooper 360 last night, also talking about Geithner and his plan.
GERGEN: I do think that this as a publicity matter, a public relations matter was a black eye, and when the plan was introduced last night on the Hill, briefed to congressional staff, that it met with a rude reception, skepticism, sarcasm, even laughter from some Republican quarters, and then today got this negative reaction on the Hill. I think this is not what they wanted. It’s not what they planned for.
RUSH: Really?
GERGEN: This administration needs an economic spokesman who can speak with authority and be respected for what he says, or she says. Right now they haven’t quite found that person in Tim Geithner, so it’s very, very important, not only for the president, but for Tim Geithner, to get back on track quickly and to establish his authority and his gravitas.
RUSH: Well, how do you come out and say we’re socialists and are plan is socialiam, how do you say that? They’re trying to cover up what they’re trying to do. But forget all that. They told us this guy’s tax cheatedness had to be overlooked because he was the only guy that could do this job. In fact, Jonathan Alter, on MSNBC on January 13th, was asked, ‘Is there a bipartisan feeling here that Geithner’s got a problem with taxes? What’s the deal on this, Jonathan?’
ALTER: It does seem to be an honest mistake. It would really be a shame if something like this sunk the nomination. We are in very serious times. They’re quite different than 1993 when Zoe Baird’s nomination was sunk for attorney general over this kind of nanny problem. Geithner is, by all accounts, the only person in Washington who fully understands TARP, you know, $700 billion. We cannot afford at this point, unless there’s gross malfeasance, to take him out of the picture.
RUSH: Gross malfeasance? You try doing what he did and see if you stay unindicted. Excuse me. So there you have Jonathan Alter totally uninformed, in the tank, blindly following the crowd with no curiosity whatsoever. How does he feel today? Can he go out and make the case Geithner’s the only guy that could do this? We gotta look past the fact that he didn’t pay his taxes on purpose, ’cause he’s the only guy that could handle it. In fact, let’s go back even further. January 14th, Andrea Mitchell, NBC News, Washington, she was on with Joe Scarborough, the cohostette, Mika Brzezinski, said, ‘Tim Geithner, is this a big problem, some tax issue for this guy?’
MITCHELL: He is hugely smart; they need him right away on the job. I think both senators in the — you know, Democrats and Republicans from the finance committee say that they need him right away to get confirmed. He did his own taxes, by the way, which is — and then he got an accountant who didn’t tell him all the back taxes that he needed to pay.
RUSH: He did his own taxes, and he screwed up, and he’s the only guy that can handle TARP. And then you go to Obama Monday night at the presser, (paraphrasing) ‘Well, I don’t want to step on Tim’s toes here, he’s got his big presentation tomorrow.’ So Obama builds up all these expectations and Geithner went out there, I mean looked like a little weasel. He looked like an authoritarian little weasel out there, and, ‘Well, we’re not going to announce the plan ’til we get it right, no details.’ Bye-bye stock exchange to the tune of 400 points down. What are we today? Waiting for the number to pop up here. We’re up 17. Big whoop. Yip yip yip yip yahoo.