Geithner To Retire His Role As Pinata?

5709925Meet Tim Geithner, the Obama administration's human piñata. Though maybe for not much longer.

Given how regularly he gets smacked around by critics of the president's economic policies, Geithner can be forgiven for feeling like a piñata sometimes. With the nation's unemployment rate hovering over 10%, he's the guy everyone gets to hate. Check out the latest Rasmussen survey which reports that 42% of the public now believes that he's doing a poor job dealing both with the credit crisis as well as with the sundry federal bailout programs. (I'll have more to say about that in a moment.)

The good news for Geithner - if you can term it that - is that the figures remain unchanged from the last time Rasmussen asked that question in a March survey. I don't think he's losing much sleep over any of this. Besides, there's no reason to shed tears for the guy. Geithner knew what he was suiting up for when he accepted the president's invitation to serve as his Treasury Secretary. Also, he was given a chance to play the role of hero. With the economy rapidly contracting and the financial credit system frozen, history would remember Geithner fondly - as would the private sector after leaving government service to find a better paying job - if he could oversee a turnaround.

It's been bumpy. Geithner's choices are wildly unpopular with conservatives and libertarians - in particular, the $787 billion stimulus plan Congress passed this year as well as the hundreds of billions in taxpayer bailouts handed out to Wall Street last fall (when, it's rightly pointed out, Geithner headed the New York Fed.) But this is no longer a time of reflection and the hyperbole is passing the point of ridiculous.

Take a gander at the video clip below in which Texas Republican Kevin Brady insulted Geithner during a session of the House Joint Economic Committee on Thursday. After calling him a failure, Brady went on to suggest that Geithner quit because he's such an incompetent. 7(For good measure He also said Geithner's failure was beginning "to reflect on your president."

Chalk up some - OK, most - of this to partisan sniping. Republicans have been hammering away since the Democrats took power. "Where are the jobs?" being one of their favorite talking points - and it's an effective one. The frustrating thing about Geithner is his low-key style. He comes across as bland and the public is unsure what to make either of him or his policies.

In fact, that same Rasmussen poll found that 41% of Americans have no any idea what they think about Geithner, compared with 31% in two surveys carried out earlier in the year. In that vacuum, his economic policies have been defined by the administration's sharpest critics.

But Geithner's done with the mild-mannered Clark Kent routine. After Brady's public upbraiding, Geithner finally showed that he had a pair and fired back, saying that he agreed "with almost nothing" of what Brady said. He also expressed pride at the job that his team had done in pulling the economy back from "the brink," calling out former President George W. Bush for leaving Mr. Obama an economy in such a mess.

"Again, it's just a basic fact," he said. "A year ago, this economy was falling at the rate of 6 percent a year. We were losing between half a million and three-quarters of a million jobs a month," he told Brady. He added that the trend had slowed sharply as a result of steps taken by the Obama administration.

The statistics bear him out. The nation lost more than 700,000 jobs each month during the first quarter. By comparison, October nonfarm payroll employment declined by 190,000. That still qualifies as lousy, but it's a lot less lousy than before Geithner was handed the keys. If current trends continue, economists expect the economy to start gaining jobs before too long. Another stat to note: During the third quarter, GDP rose 3.5% and several leading economists declared the recession to be over.

Not bad considering that the Wall Street Journal in May awarded Geithner and his boss at "F" for their handling of the economy. But this isn't cause yet for celebration. With the public so addicted to instant gratification, the White House can't really paint this as real progress until millions of unemployed Americans return work. All the same, the numbers don't lie and they are starting to shift opinion.

Writing in the New York Times, the conservative-leaning columnist, David Brooks more generously judged Geithner's economic stewardship than did his WSJ colleagues. "I hate to rely on the most overused categories in punditry, but they really do apply here. Some administrations are staffed by hedgehogs, who are guided by a few core principles. But this one is staffed by foxes, who respond flexibly to situations. In the administration's first big test, that sort of pragmatism paid off."

Reasonable assessment, though maybe too early to declare victory. At the same time, the Journal was too soon to panic. How about a "B" contingent upon showing further improvement?