Obama Interview on Economy

Below is the President-Elect Obama 60 Minute Interview.

From the transcripts Obama is pretty much backing Hank Paulson even though the interviewer tried to point out the $300 Billion hasn't done much.

Kroft: Are you in sync with Secretary Paulson in terms of how the $700 billion is being used?

Mr. Obama: Well, look, Hank Paulson has worked tirelessly under some very difficult circumstances. We've got an unprecedented crisis, or at least something that we have not seen since the Great Depression. And I think Hank would be the first one to acknowledge that probably not everything that's been done has worked the way he had hoped it would work. But I'm less interested in looking backwards than I am in looking forwards.

Kroft: The government has spent almost $300 billion out of the TARP program.

Mr. Obama: Right.

Kroft: Money that was set aside to help the financial industry. And nothing much has changed if you look at it. Nothing much has changed. It’s $300 billion. Why is that?

Mr. Obama: I think the part of the way to think about it is things could be worse. I mean, we could have seen a lot more bank failures over the last several months. We could have seen an even more rapid deterioration of the economy, even a bigger drop in the stock market. So part of what we have to measure against is what didn't happen and not just what has happened.

Having said that, there's no doubt that we have not been able yet to reset the confidence in the financial markets and in the consumer markets and among businesses that allow the economy to move forward in a strong way. And my job as president is gonna be to make sure that we restore that confidence.

Even more it's not clear just how much communication is going on between the transition team and the Treasury Secretary.

Who wants to bet the entire $700 Billion is gone before Obama takes office?

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TARP funds Vanishing

Rob, Thanks for the post, I enjoyed the video.

I'm shocked that almost 50% of the TARP funds have already been deployed. Not only that, we no NOTHING of the specific details of the spending of the funds. We DO need an accounting system of tracking funds being used. This is the only way we will able of administering whether or not the bailout was successful. Obama indicates that we should be thankful that things are not worse. However we must also recall that the population in the 30's was approximately 125Million. And also 7million people DIED from faminine. I would hope that things do not get that bad.

"I don’t know the exact route to the ‘end game’ nor am I able to predict the ups, downs, and disruptions along the way. Having said that, I intuitively think the standard of living enjoyed by upper and middle economic class Americans and Canadians is likely to decline over time – perhaps more abruptly than one would like to imagine..."

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