Michelle Malkin » Obama’s worse joke — and insult to American taxpayers’ intelligence

Obama’s worse joke — and insult to American taxpayers’ intelligence

By Michelle Malkin • March 20, 2009 12:38 AM

Yep, Barack Obama’s Special Olympics remark on Jay Leno was thoughtless.

But he made an even worse joke — intentionally insulting every American taxpayer’s intelligence — when he seriously asserted on the late-night talk show that Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner was doing an “outstanding job.”

Gag:

President Barack Obama says his embattled treasury chief, Timothy Geithner, is doing an “outstanding job.”

In a taped appearance on “The Tonight Show”, he told host Jay Leno that Geithner is a smart guy who’s been handed an incredibly full plate. But he’s handling it all with grace and good humor. Listing the recession, the banking crisis and the need to coordinate with other countries, Obama acknowledged Geithner’s “on the hot seat”. But he says too many in Washington are trying to figure out who to blame for things — when they should be focused on fixing them.

Obama claimed to take personal responsibility…but not until he whinged a bit about inheriting his economic headaches from the Bush administration.

The “outstanding” Geithner followed his boss’s footsteps by making an empty show of taking “full responsibility” tonight for the bonus botch…while bearing no consequences for his latest misjudgment:

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner confirmed Thursday that the department did talk to Sen. Chris Dodd about a clause he put forth in the stimulus legislation that would have strictly limited executive bonuses. Timothy Geithner says the Treasury was worried about legal challenges to limiting contractual bonuses.

A loophole in the bill allowed bailed-out insurance giant American International Group to keep its bonuses.

The Treasury Department was concerned that legislation that would restrict contractual bonuses would not hold up to legal challenges, Geithner said in an interview with CNN’s Ali Velshi.

“We expressed concern about this specific version. We wanted to make sure it was strong enough to survive legal challenge,” Geithner said.

…Dodd, chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, also acknowledged Wednesday his role in controversy, after previously denying having anything to do with crafting language that permitted the bonuses. Watch Geithner describe when he knew about bonuses »

Geithner said he learned the full scale of the bonus problems on March 10.

“It’s my responsibility; I was in a position where I didn’t know about those sooner. I take full responsibility for that,” he said.

Screw up, move up, baby. And cue the laugh track. Heckuva job, Timmy!

~ For the latest breaking news, be sure to join Michelle's e-mail list ~

Posted in: Tim Geithner

Printer Friendly

comments (103)

See what others have said

Note from Michelle: This section is for comments from michellemalkin.com's community of registered readers. Please don't assume that I agree with or endorse any particular comment just because I let it stand. A reminder: Anyone who fails to comply with my terms of use may lose his or her posting privilege.

Comments

« Older Comments

#101

On March 21st, 2009 at 12:01 am, sims said:

At 8:42 RetFireman said:

No one that I know thinks anything of Obama’s race. He’s an American of mixed heritage and race. The problem is that he has spent almost no time running anything except campaigns. His ideas are dreams (as in “Dreams Of My Father”) and he thinks talking can solve anything. His biggest problems are his lack of real qualifications for this particular job. I believe there may be a few racists out there hating his skin but most of us just hate that he is failing us.
#102

On March 21st, 2009 at 9:11 am, mike.musculus said:

Thank you both for your kindness in responding to my comment.

#46
On March 20th, 2009 at 9:20 am, Misscheryl said:

And

#98
On March 20th, 2009 at 8:39 pm, RetFireman said:

RetFireman:
It was an emotionally charged call (as you might well imagine…).

She’s in CA, while my brothers away, and the targeting of Mormons *really* shook her up.

I also suspect she’s talked to her family in Bronx & Brooklyn. She’s agast at the attitude her “getto” relatives have. She tried to reason with them, but the “race traitor” card was flung in her face. She’s also told me that for most city blacks she’s known, and many of the others, the non-racist veneer is quite thin.

[aside:] she thinks that, if you write into law benefits for race, whatever the reason, you’ll breed racism.

With this background in mind, as far as I can tell she based her feelings on the following projections:
OB will fold the NewPanthers & similar groups into his Civil force. Those people are black klann. Its too great an opprotunity not to, and they’ll be the leaders & shapers of the new force. Add reparations, (which she says OB’s emissaries in the community have promised *will be* done) and if that is stopped, the black community will riot. She thinks that will be the final straw. And this because no one has/will strongly oppose OB b/c of his skintone, and the solid 90+% “black vote” or him.

After everything else, incl. the coming economic collapse, complete destruction of Liberty, the “stealth” reparations already happening, the 5-15%GDP OB has promised blacks he’s going to send to Africa, the other things his emissaries have promised, which we’ve never heard about… She didn’t go into it, but when I asked about it her comment was”Do you think that woman saying Pres. Lamech would pay her all bills came from thin air? This is considered part of the repayment!”.

There’s more of that type of thing, I hope this sheds some light on her thinking. I’d sum it up by saying that it was
#103

On March 21st, 2009 at 9:12 am, mike.musculus said:

Sorry have to go!