LARRY SUMMERS STEPPING DOWN

Larry Summers is stepping down according to Fox Business and Bloomberg:

“White House officials expect Lawrence Summers to leave his job as the president’s National Economic Council director after November’s congressional elections, according to three people familiar with the matter.

His departure would leave Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner as the only member of President Barack Obama’s original top-tier economic team. Summers, 55, and the president have discussed his future plans, according to one person.”

The Obama economic team is slowly being sliced and diced as their results speak for themselves.  Unfortunately, they’ve already done their damage and the primary players remain firmly entrenched.  I said it from day one – the nominations of Geithner, Summers and Bernanke were huge mistakes by Obama and will likely seal his fate in 2012.  These men either helped or were instrumental in getting the economy into this mess in the first place.  The idea that their rehashed Clinton or Greenspan ideas would get us out of this mess was misguided from the very beginning.

I would have loved to see Obama install a new Fed Chairman and an economic team that was not a Clinton revival.  Unfortunately, he has not attempted to truly own this economy and has instead relied too much on the failed policies of the past while at the same time continually blaming the past administration.   Let’s hope this is the beginning of a new direction.  I am not getting my hopes up, however.