Hoo boy. Far be it from the Obama legacy to what we are suffering through now, but this is a necessary recounting from an insider, a former FCC Commissioner and advisor to the Clinton and Obama transition teams. It's basically an indictment of Obama's errors in being too cautious, of taking advice from George W. Bush leftovers Benanke and Paulson and compounding it by adding to his team the Clintonian neoliberals Summers, Geithner, and Emanuel. Of course, hardly any president has come into office at the same exact time as a gigantic financial crash, but the author posits that bolder and more progressive action could have put people back to work much sooner, reformed the homeownership problems, created even better health insurance, and made progress on climate change. Hundt’s proposal to set up three “green banks” for clean energy and winding down coal, efficiency enhancements for buildings, and new electrical transmission networks was shot down. Hundt underemphasizes Eric Holder's (his name does not appear in the book) refusal to jail banksters. There's nary a mention of Yertle McConnell. He brands Democratic Party "identity politics" as a problem, as only a privileged white man can. But his insider view, added to the voice of others, little-known or remembered, who were there (Austan Goolsbee, Sheila Bair, Tom Daschle), reminds us that both Clinton and Obama came into office when the economies were terrible and for the most part improved them, only to benefit their Republican successors.

Quotes: “Based on their advanced degrees and prestigious appointments, they believe that what is happening in the economy cannot be happening.”

“Obama adopted not only their assumptions about the economy’s behavior, but also their moral code.”

“Paulson focused on restoring the financial sector rather than the recovery of the real economy. Geithner cared little about the apparent injustice of helping the rich stay rich. All that mattered was cleaning up the big banks’ balance sheets with government money. The CEOS wouldn’t take any limits on the millions that they were going to get. The people saw no pain, no accountability from them. It just never happened.”

“The Clinton circle rejected Krugman, Stiglitz, and Robert Reich for being too critical of Wall Street. Obama would spend his political capital on playing nice with Wall Street.”

“Obama’s advisers explicitly said they didn’t care who got the stimulus money as long as it was spent quickly. The planners passed on the chance to refinance student loans and left this market to the private sector.”

“Economists predict wrong most everything in the immediate future, and in the long run, they are all dead.”

“You think of the Depression as something that is a part of history. You don’t think of it as something that could reoccur.”

“Obama ceded the public debate to long time conservative nostrums about big government as the enemy of economic growth.”

“Obama nodded to individual responsibility and collective action. For most of his two terms, this brave, inspiring man could not reconcile these antipodal aspects of the country’s culture.” ( )