In a move that stunned the international financial community, President George W. Bush today announced that Stanley A. Weinberg was his choice to replace Alan Greenspan as Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board. Weinberg is Mr. Bush's longtime personal financial advisor at Morgan Stanley. "He's like a member of the family," Bush said.
The president dismissed as "predictable" the criticisms that Weinberg had never served on a regional federal reserve bank, never participated in discussions about international banking, had never run a company, and was not an economist. "I trust him," the president said. "I know what is in his heart."
"He's just like you see it in those Morgan Stanley commercials -- another member of the family," the president added. "He set up the college funds we used to put Jenna and Barbara through college, and sat with us at the girls' graduations. He put together the trust we used to purchase the ranch at Crawford. He is just a whiz at numbers -- what better qualification than to deal with all those numbers they have to deal with at the Fed?"
The Fed choice was the latest in a spate of nominations made by the president. The day began with the White House announcement of a new chief of the Food and Drug Administration -- Billy Bob Garmer, the head pharmacist at Wayne Drug in Crawford. "He has been my personal pharmacist for years now," the president said. I've watched him put all kinds of drugs together behind that counter. He knows everything there is to know about all these medications. And he is a good man."
That was followed by the presidential pick to replace Michael Brown as head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, FEMA: Dr. James Kilgallen, who has served since the beginning of the Bush presidency as his personal physician. "Dr Kilgallen was the first one on the scene when I was choking on that pretzel while I was watching the Texas Longhorns football game. I could have died! But he stepped in and performed that Heimlich maneuver without skipping a beat. I thought, if he can manage that kind of emergency, he can manage anything! And he is a good man."
One earlier nomination, however was withdrawn before the end of the day. The White House had announced at noon the nominee for chief of health for the Department of Veterans Affairs, Chester McFadden, the president's personal veterinarian who has cared for the Bush dogs Spot, an English Springer Spaniel, and Barney, a Scottish Terrier. The nomination was withdrawn at 4 pm with no explanation.