The American Spectator : The Spectacle Blog : Goodbye Goolsbee

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Megan McArdle has written a retrospective of outgoing Council of Economic Advisors chair Austan Goolsbee for the Atlantic, portraying Goolsbee as a truthteller who was never able to commit to fully engaging in intra-White House politics.

The tone of the piece suggests that Goolsbee doesn't consider his short CEA tenure much of a success. In a way, that's problematic for the White House, because you couldn't have grown a better CEA chair for Obama in a lab, in certain ways. As a professor at the University of Chicago -- the intellectual seat of free-market economics -- Goolsbee was perfectly positioned to give centrist credibility to ideas that would move U.S. policy to the left. And no economist was better prepared to convince the public of the administration's arguments -- he won a national award for extemporaneous speaking in high school. The success of his "White House White Board" videos speaks to that.

We'll see who Obama chooses as Goolsbee's replacement. But it's unlikely to be anyone better suited to advance the football for liberals.

View all comments (4) | Leave a comment

Teflon93| 8.11.11 @ 12:15PM

Facts beat arguments every single time.

WL| 8.11.11 @ 12:27PM

It's something how these people just keep doing the same things....Maybe Krugman can be his new CEA???

Then we can hear how he is the Mr. Center of the bunch.
Then we can hear how he never really FIT IN
Then he can go back to the NYT...
Then we can hear how he says we are done for...or as Romer says...."$(**$#"
Then we can hear how he left...with a big party...

And the party will go on and on and on and on and on and on....

Mr. Lawler...I would like to make a humble suggestion for your next column on whatever Rat is running off the sinking ship at the time...here goes...

Next rat Flees...
Replacement Doesn't matter...
Nor their input...
Nor their Exit...
OBAMA HATES BUSINESS...
OBAMA will keep doing the same things....
And blaming the same people....
SO JUST KEEP WALKING ....NOTHING TO SEE HERE.

Occam's Tool| 8.11.11 @ 3:28PM

It's hard to advance the football when your offensive line has advanced muscular dystrophy, your quarterback has advanced Alzheimer's, your running back is recovering from bilateral traumatic amputation of both feet, and your wide receiver is a thalidomide baby.

Flee| 8.11.11 @ 4:02PM

The white board video would have been successful if he was addressing 5 year olds. Does this administration really believe such presentations endear them to voters? Treating adults as children is no way to win friends and influence people. As Queen said...Another One Bites The Dust.