Timothy Geithner has been confirmed as President Obama's Treasury Secretary by a vote of 60-34. Clearly no one wanted to make an example out of Obama's pick at Treasury and derail the nomination since growing confidence in Obama's financial stewardship should be in everyone's interest, but there was some strong opposition to Geithner on both sides of the aisle due to his admitted failure to pay $34,000 in taxes. 30 Republicans voted No, as did 3 Democrats and 1 Independent.

From TPM:

Tim Geithner was just approved by the Senate, 60-34, with 30 members of the 41-strong Republican conference voting no. That margin suggests that a successful filibuster was within reach for Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), although GOPers ultimately did not attempt to slow down the confirmation. Even more interestingly, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) opposed Geithner, joining three liberal Democrats: Tom Harkin (IA), Russ Feingold (WI), and Robert Byrd (WV).

Prior to the vote, the Obama administration expressed the President's utter confidence in Geithner even as they acknowledged Geithner's error.

"Secretary-designate Geithner ... admitted that he'd made honest mistakes that could and should have been avoided," White House spokesman Robert Gibbs told a briefing. "He made amends by paying the back taxes and interest that he owes."

He added that Obama believes Geithner, the chairman of the New York Federal Reserve Bank, has a "unique background," and would be "a tremendous leader of our economic team" if confirmed by the U.S. Senate, as expected, later on Monday.

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by Zach Carter, MediaWire Blogger

President-elect Barack Obama announced his economic transition team yesterday--and we'll get to that--but first let's take a look at the top economic stories from the week that you might not have heard--but need to know.

With so many recent headlines detailing the government's policy position on some of the nation's largest corporations, it's important to remember that economic policy ought to include people living at the other end of the economic spectrum.

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In May 2006 Timothy Geithner, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and Barack Obama's likely choice for Treasury Secretary, gave a speech to the New York University Stern School of Business Third Credit Risk Conference. You can read the full text here. Some excerpts:

Credit derivatives have contributed to dramatic changes in the process of credit intermediation, and the benefits of these changes seem compelling. They have made possible substantial improvements in the way credit risk is managed and facilitated a broad distribution of risk outside the banking system. By spreading risk more widely, by making it easier to purchase and sell protection against credit risk and to actively trade credit risk, and by facilitating the participation of a large and very diverse pool of non-bank financial institutions in the business of credit, these changes probably improve the overall efficiency and resiliency of financial markets.

With the advent of credit derivatives, concentrations of credit risk are made easier to mitigate, and diversification made easier to achieve. Credit losses, whether from specific, individual defaults or the more widespread distress that accompanies economic recessions, will be diffused more broadly across institutions with different risk appetite and tolerance, and across geographic borders. Our experience since the introduction of these new instruments--a period that includes a major asset price shock and a global recession--seems to justify the essentially positive judgment we have about the likely benefits of ongoing growth in these markets.

Despite the benefits to financial resilience, the changes in the credit markets that are the subject of your conference have also provoked some concerns and unease, even among those on the frontier of innovation and the most active participants in these markets.

These concerns are based in part on uncertainty--a candid acknowledgment that there is a lot we do not yet know about how these instruments and the increased role of nonbank institutions in these markets will affect how the financial markets are likely to function in conditions of stress. [...]

Let me conclude by reiterating the fundamental view that the wave of innovation underway in credit derivatives offers substantial benefits to both the efficiency and stability of our financial system.

Sounds like change we can believe in!

Update [2008-11-21 17:28:12 by Todd Beeton]:Bloomberg is reporting that Geithner at Treasury is a done deal.

President-elect Barack Obama picked Timothy Geithner, head of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, to be his Treasury secretary, with Lawrence Summers getting a senior White House role, a Democratic aide said.

Obama is also likely to nominate New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson as Commerce Secretary, and to announce his picks on Nov. 24, the person said on condition of anonymity.

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