WASHINGTON — As president-elect, Barack Obama faces a tricky task as he begins dealing ever more directly with the economic meltdown, grappling with the worst financial crisis in seven decades but not yet wielding the power to do much about it.
He won’t be a participant at President Bush’s global summit next week, although the 20 leaders attending are no doubt keenly interested in his views. And he may have to eventually push back against some members of his own party in Congress over details of a new plan to stimulate the economy.
Congress convenes for a lame-duck session Nov. 17, and Obama is giving all indications he’ll play a direct role rather than keeping his distance until he is sworn in.
“The president-elect has said he wants another stimulus; the president-elect therefore has views on what that stimulus should be, and the Democratic Congress should take its cues from the president- elect,” said economist Rob Shapiro, a top Commerce Department official in the Clinton administration who is on Obama’s team of transition advisers.
Will Obama be able to pull off a smooth changeover in economic management?
“He’ll have to work very hard at it, but of course he can. This is a man who pulled off the smoothest campaign in history,” said Shapiro.
