Obama names economic team

Pledging "to bring together the best minds in America" to guide him, President-elect Barack Obama announced his new economic team Monday morning in Chicago.

As expected, Obama announced Timothy Geithner as Secretary of the Treasury and Lawrence Summers as director of the National Economic Council. Obama also named Christina Romer to serve as chair of the Council of Economic advisors, and named Melody Barnes to serve as Director of the Domestic Policy Council.

Barnes, an African American woman, would play a key role in managing the president's ambitious domestic policy initiatives from health care to energy policy and education. Obama described Barnes as "one of the most respected policy experts in America," and said she would be "working hand-in-hand with my economic policy team to chart a course to economic recovery."

"I've sought leaders who could offer both sound judgment and fresh thinking, both a depth of experience and a wealth of bold new ideas," Obama said at his news conference. He also said his appointments shared his "fundamental belief that we cannot have a thriving Wall Street while Main Street suffers." In America, "we rise and fall as one nation, as one people," the president-elect said.

Wall Street seemed to cheer the news, along with the announcement of a rescue package for ailing Citigroup. The two moves sent stocks sharply higher, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose almost 500 points, the second consecutive up day for a market that has been battered since September.

Geithner currently serves as president and CEO of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, and Summers currently teaches at Harvard University, a school he once led as president.

The announcement of Romer and Barnes brought more than diversity to his economic team. Barnes currently leads a working group for the Obama-Biden Transition Team, and served as senior domestic policy advisor in the Obama campaign. A former executive vice president for policy at the Center for American Progress, Barnes also served as chief counsel to Senator Edward Kennedy on the Senate Judiciary Committee from December 1995 until March 2003.

During the question and answer session with reporters, Obama fielded questions on his economic stimulus, his tax plans, the proposed auto bailout and the use of the $350 billion remaining in the financial rescue plan approved by Congress in October. He pledged to keep his promise for a middle class tax cut but declined to say when he would allow the Bush tax cuts on the wealthiest Americans to expire.

Obama also made news when he said he was "surprised" that the Big Three auto industry executives did not have a clear plan to present to Congress when they testified on Capitol Hill last week.