The Big Money Behind Geithner<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />
By Cliff Kincaid
 
A guy who can't figure out his own taxes is supposed to fix the economy? This is the absurd rationale being offered by media figures such as Andrea Mitchell of NBC News for confirming Timothy Geithner as Obama's Treasury Secretary after it was disclosed that he was a serial tax evader. He did his own taxes for a couple years and got into trouble, Mitchell chuckled. And everybody can relate to that, right? Mitchell is the one who deserves to be laughed at. This guy is supposed to be so smart we can entrust him with managing the entire <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />U.S. economy? She must be kidding. Does she seriously expect us to believe that? 
 
Anybody watching this bizarre spectacle unfold has to suspect there is something more to the story. Who is behind Geithner and why? And why does Obama want him? This is where the media fear to tread. As we have pointed out, major media companies such as GE (parent of NBC News) and the Washington Post Company have their own connections to Geithner through their own officials and board members. They have a conflict of interest that will never be reported by the news organizations themselves.
 
The real story, which can only emerge through talk radio and alternative media, is that Geithner has very powerful political and financial connections, not only to the media but the banking interests and lobbies that try to orchestrate U.S. policy behind the scenes.
 
The President of the New York Federal Reserve Bank, the Chinese-speaking Geithner is an associate of Henry Kissinger who can be counted on to convince the Chinese Communists to continue to buy U.S. debt and finance Obama's massive expansion of federal government power. That is why Obama and his fellow Democrats are putting so much faith in him. 
 
As Henry Kissinger recently put it, when he was celebrating U.S.-China relations on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Obama's mission is to usher in a "New World Order." He forgot to mention, of course, that it is a China-dominated New World Order in which the U.S. has become a subsidiary of China Inc. 
 
Kissinger did comment that Obama had "appointed an extraordinarily able group of people in both the international and financial fields." He didn't name names, but that obviously includes Geithner, who used to work for Kissinger Associates.
 
It also turns out that Geithner's father, Peter F. Geithner, serves on the board with Kissinger of the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations. This is the group that ran the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange, celebrating Chinese investments in the U.S. economy. In another interesting connection, it turns out that Peter F. Geithner was with the Ford Foundation and oversaw the work of Obama's mother, Ann Dunham, developing what are called microfinance programs in Indonesia.
 
It should be apparent by now that the major media aren't interested in holding Geithner accountable for his tax "mistakes" or anything else. Only the American people can do that. Fortunately, there is still time for the public to weigh in. The Senate Finance Committee has now announced that a "Hearing to Consider the Nomination of Timothy F. Geithner, to be Secretary of the Treasury" has been postponed to January 21, 2009, at 10:00 a.m., in room 215 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building. 
 
Based on what Obama has said about Geithner, and what the media have repeated ad nauseam, we are supposed to believe that he made some mistakes that were typical of an employee who had worked for an international organization, the International Monetary Fund. But this doesn't hold up because he admits he was told by the IMF about the procedures and necessity of paying those taxes. So the failure to pay these taxes looks like a case of tax cheating. If it wasn't cheating, then he didn't understand the tax code or didn't pay enough attention to get it done right. This doesn't seem like a proper credential for the post of Treasury Secretary, with jurisdiction over the IRS.
 
There has to be something more to the rationale for confirming somebody who is this much of a conniver or this dumb to the post. What is it? 
 
It doesn't take much digging. For anybody in the dark about this, please consult and closely study his bio. Geithner is a wheeler-dealer for powerful special interests.
 
If you examine the nature of the "Group of Thirty," an affiliation which appears at the bottom of his biography, right after his Council on Foreign Relations membership, you will quickly learn that the President of the New York Federal Reserve Bank is an associate of the governor of the Chinese central bank through this mysterious organization of bankers and other top current and former officials from various countries. You will notice that other Obama nominees and associates are members, including Paul Volcker and Lawrence Summers.
 
You will also learn that this organization has been funded by¯surprise¯some of the same financial institutions getting federal bailout money. These include American International Group, Goldman Sachs and Citi, among others. Because it has a website and publishes an annual report, all of this seems open and above board. But the fine print reveals that some of the meetings are by "invitation only."
 
The entire list of "contributors and supporters" of the "Group of Thirty" is quite impressive. You will find not only U.S. financial institutions getting bailout money, but central banks around the world and Arab financial interests. In addition, you also find private financial interests, including the hedge fund operated by billionaire and Obama contributor George Soros.
 
But I can find no stories in the major U.S. media critically examining the history and purpose of this organization. Could it be because selected reporters are invited to its meetings on a deep background basis? And that they develop financial sources at these meetings that they swear to protect and defend? 
 
On Wednesday, discussing the Geithner tax evasion problem on the Fox News "Special Report" show, Fred Barnes warned that "if there is a huge public reaction to this against him, well, he might go down. But short of that, I agree, he will probably be confirmed." This helps explain why we are constantly hearing the media parrot Obama's claims that Geithner's "mistakes" were "innocent" or "common." They are determined to quell any possible "public reaction" against him. That is why we are being told it is much ado about mostly nothing. It looks like the media have succeeded in convincing most Senate Republicans, except for Jeff Sessions of Alabama, not to raise a stink.
 
However, in addition to the tax evasion, there is also the matter of Geithner having some "household help" while not knowing whether they were legally in the U.S. and not bothering to check when the legal status of one of the housekeepers expired. This aspect of the problem is being largely ignored by the media, rather than just being played down, because they realize that while most people fear the tax code and understand how somebody could make a "mistake" or two, the hiring or employment of illegals is another matter. Most members of the public are not rich enough to hire this kind of outside help.
 
But many members of the inside-the-beltway media are. As Michael Lind, a fellow at the New America Foundation once noted, journalists do not oppose illegal immigration because they benefit from it. He noted that journalists belong to an affluent class in America that employs immigrant maids, nannies and gardeners.
 
Perhaps they shared some of Geithner's household help.
            Cliff Kincaid is the Editor of Accuracy in Media, and can be contacted at cliff.kincaid@aim.org.