Gary Cohn can be easily replaced if he leaves Washington

NY Post ^ | September 10, 2017 | Jonathon Trugman

[Oshkalaboomboom]

Let me start by acknowledging the outstanding job National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn’s team has done swaying the media into thinking Armageddon would occur if he left the White House.

I get that Cohn was a respected trader on Wall Street at Goldman Sachs. However, Goldman generally mints exceptional talent. To think there is no one else who can steer this economy is sheer folly.

There are numerous talents that come out of Goldman, Morgan Stanley, Bank of America and JPMorgan who would be very well-suited to run the National Economic Council or the Federal Reserve. So if it turns out Cohn exits the administration, or does not get the nod to run the Fed, there will be no apocalypse.

The recent checkered past of Wall Street — and Goldman Sachs in particular — seems to be moving down to Pennsylvania Avenue.

Jon Corzine was a legendary trader and a co-CEO at Goldman, plus a US senator and a governor.

Corzine was reportedly in the running to be President Obama’s treasury secretary. That’s the same Jon Corzine who as MF Global’s new CEO leveraged up the balance sheet into such an out-of-control mess that, to put it kindly, it blew up.

Former Goldman CEO Robert Rubin — revered by many, but blamed by more — was President Clinton’s treasury chief and sowed the seeds for the Great Recession by gutting the Glass-Steagall Act, which helped bring on the mortgage crisis in 2008.

John Meriweather also comes to mind. Merriweather was vice chairman of Solomon Brothers and ran its legendary fixed income arbitrage desk, only to leave and found Long Term Capital Management — where he almost brought down the global financial markets in 1998 after only four years in business.

[Oshkalaboomboom]

If he's such a great money manager he should shut up and manage the money or get out of the way for someone who will. No one will miss one less Washington Prima Donna.

[Toddsterpatriot]

Former Goldman CEO Robert Rubin — revered by many, but blamed by more — was President Clinton’s treasury chief and sowed the seeds for the Great Recession by gutting the Glass-Steagall Act, which helped bring on the mortgage crisis in 2008.

Robert Rubin was a partisan hack, but Glass-Steagall wouldn't have prevented banks from writing bad mortgages.