Dear President-Elect Obama,
As a 14-year-old progressive blogger and student of history, I did everything in my power to work towards your election. I phone banked, organized, knocked on doors, and traveled to swing states. I did this not for Barack Obama the man, but for the change which I believe American needs.
Our effective campaign and hopeful message won us victory on November 4th, but I fear we are seeing less change come to Washington than we were promised. In the midst of the worsening economic crisis, the American people have a renewed interest in a government which is efficient, honest, open, and trustworthy. Such a government cannot be led by individuals who themselves lack those qualities.
Timothy Geithner exemplifies the same old politics you rightfully condemned in the campaign. As a young person, reading about the proposed head of the IRS not paying his own taxes naturally fills my mind with a certain amount of cynicism about the culture of the administration. After eight years of a political climate which you yourself criticized for cronyism and shady deal-making, I fail to see a significant change from the status quo.
I do not believe that Timothy Geithner is an evil man, but it is clear to all that there are things which cannot be excused by honest mistakes. The issue of whether the proposed Treasury Secretary was intentionally withholding the money or not is dubious and completly irrelevant. Whatever the case, Americans should not feel comfortable with anyone who can misplace $34,000 of his own money in charge of the Department of the Treasury!
My parents are law-abiding citizens who work full time and pay their fair share of taxes. I was taught that an "I forgot" apology doesn't cut it when it comes to justifying $34,000 of unpaid taxes. If my parents were caught in an audit with that much unpaid, they would face legal consequences.
Mr. President-Elect, this scandal has emerged days before your Inauguration and I understand the political pressure to bury it and move on. But this is not the New Politics you promised America during the election, and you must be careful when fighting the old politics that you do not adopt it yourself. There is so much to be done in the next four years, and it can only be accomplished with leaders who are personally spotless. If Timothy Geithner does not fit this description, he should not lead the Department of the Treasury.
By fourteen years of age, I was almost irreversibly jaded by politics. I traveled to the convention to blog live and there you inspired my entire generation with a promise of change and hope. Trillions of dollars on infrastructure and bailouts don't get to the heart of our national malaise; my generation is not stepping up because young people have not seen the point of trying to change the unsavory ways of Washington. The power of the oratory and the clarity of your vision offered you an opportunity to set an example for what honest government really is.
To squander this opportunity to involve young people in the democratic process would be more than foolish, it would be criminal. That is what Geithner symbolizes: the ability of this new order to hold itself accountable. The choice is yours.
Yours Sincerely,
Eyck Freymann
www.YoungSentinel.com
1 comment:
"Change" doesn't mean that Obama has to be Bush's polar opposite, and we can't be happy with everything our new president does. We have to weigh everything he does over his entire term in office. Geithner had mde an error that many Americans can make, and many Americans end up paying penalties, but we must judge him on if he can fix this economy - and I do agree that the misplacement of money makes me less confident with him, more so because a lot of the "TARP" fund hasn't been kept track of.
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