Working Capitol

For those who love insider gossip, this piece on Obama's economic team offers plenty and explains to an extent why the first two years were such a policy disaster. I read it as a validation of much of the lefty criticism of his picks.

If you're pressed for time, this shorter version captures the essence of the personality conflicts among Obama's advisors. I especially liked these two bits:

Mr. Baker writes that the president’s economic team “fractured repeatedly over philosophy (should jobs or deficits take priority?) and personality (who got to attend which meetings?), resulting in feuds that ultimately helped break it apart.” [...]

“To some of his colleagues, Summers was an eye-rolling intellectual bully,” Baker writes. “‘He’s much better at telling you why you’re stupid than creating a system that can produce usable policy solutions,’ said one Obama adviser, who, like others, did not want to be named criticizing Summers. At meetings, colleagues with differing viewpoints felt the full force of his capacity for finding flaws in their reasoning.”

I always thought the odious Mr. Summers was Obama's worst choice and the sluggish pace of recovery confirms the wrong people won the jobs versus deficit debate. Which suggests if Obama had only listened to the hippies, we would be a much different place right now.

It's not too late yet but, time is running out.

[More posts daily at the Detroit News.]