Alexander Hamilton - America's First Financial Blogger

Alexander Hamilton had a lot on his plate as the first secretary of the treasury (so the president has told us), but he did find time to write the Federalist Papers that allowed us to peer into his views and how he was thinking about the role of the federal government.  Of course, no one knew for sure who was writing the Federalist Papers, and he wrote them mostly before he was secretary of the treasury...and, he had a couple of folks helping him.

But we think Geithner might be well served to have a link off of treasury.gov (or better yet treasurydirect.gov for the Central Banks around the world ;-)) to his personal blog so we can figure out what he's thinking.  We sorely need to know how his plan(s) fits into an overarching theme that's in concert with other efforts.  He's got a white paper up there now, but those are so boring and hard to digest.  Geithner needs to get with the times.  

Hell, we'd be happy if he was just trolling at the Huffington Post with the user name "Timmeh!"

He could essentially replicate everything Hamilton did:

1.  Anonymity: Check - use blogger or typepad...or open.salon.com ;-)

2.  Help from Like Minded Friends: Check - guest bloggers - Summers is dying to go after Krugman again, and Romer would rather write than go on all those Sunday morning talk shows

3.  Volume: Check - the Federalist Papers had over 50 essays and blogging, if done right, is a high frequency affair

Right now the "Secretary's Corner" at treasury.gov looks like this:

 Sorta empty...No wonder Krugman is eating his lunch.  Of course the Secretary of the Treasury has to keep things close to his vest. He is, after all, the lead sales person for US debt in the world.  So posts like this would be inappropriate:

3/23/2009

Not much sleep last night.  Ben called me like 2 in the morning and woke my ass up.  Couldn't go back to sleep after that.  He said, "dude, let's throw the currency and just inflate our way out of this shit."  I said, "I gotta get the Chinese to buy!  Obama's budget is HUGE!  How's that gonna to go over."  He said, "Fuck ‘em.  We don't need their money, we'll print our own and hung up."   He used to be my boss.  I'm still a bit intimidated by him.

Another post he may want to avoid would be along the lines of:

4/2/2009

This plan is totally going to work.  I'm going to really give it to these guys who always made more than me.  

First, I'm going to do this crazy stress test stuff on the banks in April.  Then, I'm going to do this private-public partnership stuff in May.  In the meantime, I going to get this super conservatorship authority passed in Congress.  I can just see how it will all go:

Me and Bair of FDIC: Hi Mr. Pandit (CEO of Citibank). Your stress test results have just come in. They aren't so good. You'll need to go out and raise more capital. Sorry, man. A girl's got to regulate!

Pandit:  Are you threatening to make my stress test results public?  No one already wants to give me money at a reasonable rate (like the credit cards I issue). I'd have to pay 18% for money right now!

Me and Bair: Well, Mr. Pandit...ummm...I don't know what to say. Hey, what about some of that stuff on your books? Could you sell that?

Pandit:  But, I'd have to sell it into a distressed market?  I won't get jack for it.  Maybe I can sell it to these hedge fund guys who don't care how much they pay because you guys gave them so much leverage.

Me and Bair: Yeah, but they don't have to buy.  If you can't unload it at the price they want I have these new conservatorship powers.  I'll take you out anyway.  So it's either the price we like or you exit stage left with the disgrace of having been the guy who presided over the destruction of the world's biggest bank.

Pandit: But, but...

Me and Bair: Listen. We wouldn't want anything bad to happen to you or to your family. So, it's either your signature or your brains on this contract.

Pandit: You guys are Assholes.

Me and Bair: We know.

OK, so Geithner probably should not be so transparent.  

But, we shouldn't hear from him sporadically and only during congressional hearings or rare interviews.  We have to know what the larger plan is to the extent he can share it without tipping his hand completely.  

And the press needs to do a better job at explaining the options.  It's not easy to find a chart simply outlining the advantages and disadvantages between nationalization, continued bailouts, or other options.  The mess we are in is complex and simplification to a certain point helps, but oversimplification does not.  Heading into the Iraq war the context was simplified to a ridiculous level of "we're fighting the terrorists, you're either on board with that or you are not."  

That level of gross simplification is not productive.  But making the complex and abstract more tangible is important for the public to have a fair discourse.  We've only seen glimmers of that over the past year, and it hasn't come from the mainstream press or the government.  Just as Obama is risking over exposure to explain his decisions, Geithner should do the same to help explain the complexities of his situation.  If public appearances aren't his thing, this new era of technology offers him options that he should seize.  We may agree or disagree, but we’ll be focused more on “why this versus that” versus “who knew what when.”

That's all we're saying...dude. 

Secretary Geithner: "You see, I'm really torn between Blogger and Tumblr.  I really like the graphics support on Tumblr but it sort of cheapens the message."