Milestones

  • RESIGNED

    Lawrence Summers, director of President Obama's National Economic Council, announced on Sept. 21 that he would step down from the post at year's end and return to teaching at Harvard University, where he had once been president. Summers' resignation comes as little surprise to many Beltway insiders. A former Secretary of the Treasury under President Clinton, Summers is known to have jockeyed for power with other economics luminaries gathered together by the Obama Administration, not always to great success. Republicans turned Summers into something of a whipping boy, calling for his firing as the U.S. unemployment rate inched toward 10%. He also became something of a bête noire for progressives frustrated by the bailouts and stimulus packages largely authored by Summers and current Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, which many claim did far more to help the big banks responsible for the financial crisis than the tens of millions of ordinary Americans hit by the recession.