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Who will replace Larry Summers as head of the National Economic Council and President Obama's economic majordomo?
Will it be Anne Mulcahy, ex-CEO of Xerox, Dick Parsons, ex-CEO of TimeWarner, or perhaps, Laura Tyson, NEC chief under President Bill Clinton.
Over the next few weeks, we'll find out. But don't hold your breath in anticipation. As long as Barack Obama is president, the composition of any new White House economic team may be largely irrelevant.
Advisers only advise. It's the presidents who have to do the deciding. And what evidence do we have that President Obama is unhappy with any of his big economic policy decisions?
Sure, he's not happy with the results â?? the $1.4 trillion deficits, 10% unemployment and dire public sentiment. But we're nearly at the two-year anniversary of his election and the president seems oblivious to the link between his actions and his results.
In fact, judging from his recent stump speeches and Monday's CNBC Town Hall, everyone at the White House has been doing an â??outstandingâ? job on the economy. And the way he talks, everyone certainly includes him.
Whether President Obama is delusional or just playing dumb until the mid-term elections is unclear. But obviously something is afoot. CEA Chief Christina Romer is gone. OMB Director Peter Orszag is gone. Larry Summers is gone. And soon White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel will be gone.
Has President Obama ever publicly expressed any misgivings about any of his economic policies? Has he ever publicly admitted to any errors in the big stimulus, Obamacare or the Detroit bailout?
I can't find any notable mea culpas. The president only offers apologies for his tone, not his policies.
At the recent Town Hall, he confessed his job was â??not just a matter of implementing good policies but also of setting a better tone so that everybody feels like we can start cooperating again?â? He then gave John Boehner and the Republicans a nice thorough bashing a few minutes later.
Change never comes easy â?? even for someone who constantly promises it.
But let's take a leap in logic and say that President Obama is willing to revisit his way of thinking. And let's say President Obama brings on Anne Mulcahy.
For the White House, she's a no-brainer of a hire â?? a big and beautiful PR gesture. She is a Fortune 500 CEO. Right background. Right gender. â??You see American business, I am listening!â?
But that's all optics. What about the substance? What can Mulcahy realistically do to affect any changes at the White House?
After all, Obama's big economic policies like the $787 billion stimulus and the healthcare and financial reforms (impacting more than a third of all U.S. GDP) are already well underway. The bills are passed. Bureaucracies are in motion.
Can Mulcahy persuade Elizabeth Warren to go easy on America's banks and credit card companies at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau?
Or can Mulcahy convince HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius to do away with the onerous burdens of Obamacare on American business?
Especially unlikely: that Mulcahy will convince White House political operatives like David Axelrod or David Plouffe to extend the Bush tax cuts for America's â??rich.â?
It might be good economics, but it's bad politics. And the president is first and foremost a politician. Can you imagine President Obama defying Axelrod's advice and the progressive wing of his party in support of the tax cuts?
Which brings me back to the dilemma facing Anne Mulcahy or any new NEC chief.
She's doesn't control the Treasury like Tim Geithner. She doesn't control the Federal Reserve like Ben Bernanke. The only thing she can control is her words to the president. All those are meaningless if the president hasn't decided he wants to listen.
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