Monday, July 27, 2015

When a Goldman Sachs Flack Did PR for Geithner

By Timothy Carney

Maybe it's just a story of a crisis-era Treasury Department alumnus being loyal to his old boss. But it also looks like a Goldman Sachs honcho doing PR for an Obama appointee as a way of ingratiating himself to powerful government employees.

An open-records inquiry turned up this entertaining email exchange:

By January 2013, veteran Democratic operative Jake Siewert had aready passed through the revolving door, leaving Treasury to become Goldman's head of corporate communications. But as his old boss, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, was leaving, Siewert wrote in an email, "Still doing my old job."

He pitched Business Insider editor Henry Blodgett a clever idea for a little story:

"How about a Geithner chart of the day?" Siewert suggested.

"Dow Jones at 8000 when confirmed as Treasury Secretary[.] Dow Jones at 13825 as he begins his last day on the job."

Blodgett liked the idea, forwarded it to his deputy Joe Weisenthal, and by 9:33 am, BI's Lucas Kawa had the story online, currently headlined "Tim Geithner's Amazing Rally"

When Geithner took office, the markets were in free-fall and the Dow Jones briefly dipped below 7000. Under his steady leadership, the DJIA has more than doubled from its 2009 trough.
His vigorous defense of the banking system played a big role in ensuring a turnaround.

When the story was up, Blodget replied to Siewert with the URL...

Read the rest here.

1 comment:

  1. The statist ass kissing conglomerate(s) know where their bread is buttered.

    All I can say is at least we have some independent news sources/internet...the world hasn't gone completely dark yet.

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