SCOURING THE BUDGET….Barack Obama rolled out his economic team today: Tim Geithner at Treasury, Christina Romer to head up the CEA, Larry Summers to head the White House Economic Council, and Melody Barnes as chair of his domestic policy council. Ben Bernanke, of course, is already in place as Fed chief. But what about Peter Orszag? Why wasn’t he up on stage with the rest of them? Ben Smith provides a clue:
Obama’s staff won’t elaborate, but the President-Elect said just now that he’d roll out a plan to cut the federal budget tomorrow — something both presidential candidates said they’d do, but neither detailed.
“[T]o make the investments we need, we’ll have to scour our federal budget, line-by-line, and make meaningful cuts and sacrifices as well — something I’ll be discussing further tomorrow,” Obama said.
I’m not sure why Obama wants to have a whole separate rollout for this — maybe he just wants more than one day’s worth of headlines? — but obviously Orszag will be the star of that particular show. Via Taegan Goddard.