By John Temple Ligon

Former White House Chief of Staff Andy Card

A new Secretary can come from two different directions: the inside or the outside.

Last week columnist George Will advocated tapping Alan Greenspan, head of the Federal Reserve since August, 1987. Will identified five purposes for Greenspan’s credibility:

(1) As the Doha round of tariff reduction talks continue, the Treasury secretary must stay the course and follow the discipline of free trade.

White House Chief of Staff Andy Card informs President Bush of the September 11th attacks on the Twin Towers during his visit to Emma E. Booker Elementary School in Sarasota, Florida. (2) As the dollar continues to fall, the Treasury secretary must remind us the dollar’s fall is managed and intended.

(3) The Treasury secretary is expected to defend whatever tax reform comes out of the White House.

(4) With record deficits for the Bush Administration’s Big Government Era, the Treasury secretary must move for spending restraint.

(5) The big domestic fight for the next four years is Social Security’s partial privatization. Privatization is somewhat based on the Chilean model. University of Chicago economist Milton Friedman and his “Chicago boys” steered Chile in the privatization direction decades ago, and its social security program works swimmingly.

White House outsider former Texas Senator Phil Graham is mentioned for the job. However the president might look to Wall Street this time.

Among the insiders Former White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card was rumored a front–runner last week . However, yesterday when he was asked if he were still in serious contention, Card said, “No. Categorically, no.”

But Card is our homeboy, of sorts. He graduated from USC in structural engineering in 1971. Part of that time his roommate was Dickie Shannon, an education major who taught in the Columbia schools and later became a nightclub owner/operator.

A native of Holbrook, Massachusetts, Card was in the Massachusetts House of Representatives from 1975 until 1983, when he moved to Washington to work as President Reagan’s liaison among the nation’s governors. Card also worked in the first Bush (#41) White House as a deputy chief of staff.

The final year of the first Bush Administration, 1992, Card was Transportation secretary.

As secretary in 1992, he directed the Federal Transit Administrator to write the Midlands Transportation Association in Columbia to offer full federal support in managing the transition of the Columbia bus system from SCANA to a regional transit authority. Upon President Clinton’s inauguration several months later, Card could no longer offer to help.

During the Clinton Administration Card worked as the American automobile manufacturers’ representative in Washington, and he sat on the board at General Motors.

Bush’s first two secretaries at Treasury had doctorates in economics. Card’s terminal degree is his bachelor’s in structural engineering from USC.