Clones

Now read this paragraph from Wikipedia on Tim Geithner:

Geithner was born in Brooklyn, New York.[3] His father, Peter F. Geithner, is the director of the Asia program at the Ford Foundation in New York. During the early 1980s, Peter Geithner oversaw the Ford Foundation's microfinance programs in Indonesia being developed by Ann Dunham-Soetoro, mother of President Barack Obama, and they met in person at least once.[4] Timothy Geithner's mother, Deborah Moore Geithner, is a pianist and piano teacher in Larchmont, New York where his parents currently reside. Geithner's maternal grandfather, Charles F. Moore, was an adviser to President Dwight D. Eisenhower and served as a vice president of Ford Motor Company.[5] Geithner spent most of his childhood living outside the United States, including present-day Zimbabwe, India and Thailand, where he completed high school at International School Bangkok.[6] He then attended Dartmouth College, graduating with a A.B. in government and Asian studies in 1983.[7] He earned an M.A. in international economics and East Asian studies from Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies in 1985.[7][8] He has studied Chinese[7] and Japanese.[9]

Do you see the personal connection between Geithner and Obama in this description? Besides their parents knowing each other, they are virtually clones of each other. Because of this, I believe Obama trusts Geithner explicitly.

I'm not sure that this will work in Obama's favor, actually. It will be hard for him to be objective and critical, when he needs to be. Too much blank check here for the neo-liberal, neo-Clintonite, neo-Reaganite economic model represented by the Rubin-Summers-Geithner axis. Not enough real change.

But once again, I'm probably underestimating Barack Obama. I truly hope so.