A Competent Bush Nominee?

Ezra Klein notes that Bush’s nomination for Treasury Secretary, Goldman Sachs CEO Henry Paulson, is a “serious, competent guy” who—shockingly—supported the Kyoto Protocol. (More to the point, he has stated that unless the United States puts emissions limits in place, “U.S. companies will lose ground to their competitors.”)

That sounds nice (insofar as a pro-Wall Street Treasury Secretary can sound “nice”), but it also sounds a lot like a description of Bush’s first Treasury Secretary, Paul O’Neill, who, despite helping Ron Suskind produce a very nice book exposing the sheer mendacity and close-mindedness of the current administration, didn’t really affect much in the way of policy.