AP: Barney Frank says Obama needs to be more assertive...

Because Nero (Bush 43) is fiddling while Rome burns (checking out in the middle of the greatest Financial crisis since 1929), Rep. Barney Frank has called on the President Elect to get in the game more:

"He's going to have to be more assertive than he's been," House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank, D-Mass., told consumer advocates Thursday.

Frank, who has been dealing with both the bailout of the financial industry and a proposed rescue of Detroit automakers, said Obama needs to play a more significant role on economic issues.

"At a time of great crisis with mortgage foreclosures and autos, he says we only have one president at a time," Frank said. "I'm afraid that overstates the number of presidents we have. He's got to remedy that situation."

First of all, that's a frickin' funny line.

And I'm going to agree with Barney Frank...but at the same time disagree.

Yes, President Bush has already checked-out of Washington, but the problem is...Obama legally can't do a thing until 12:00pm, January 20th.

And by your argument, Congressman, you want the President-Elect to be responsible (i.e. take the blame) for all what happens, without any of the power that goes along with it.

This is the same situation Roosevelt faced in 1932 when he was coming into Office and Hoover tried to drag Roosevelt into the myriad of bad ideas he had for the recovery.

From Jonathan Atler:

FDR rightly figured that Hoover had the power to close the banks without his cooperation, but not the guts. If the economy slipped lower still, allowing him to enter stage left as the hero, that was fine with Roosevelt. He'd make the tough decisions when he got to office. Today's Detroit crisis poses a similar challenge to Obama. Should he step in now, or pick through the wreckage of the auto industry after he takes the oath? If he follows the Roosevelt example, he'll choose the latter, more confident course.

Roosevelt's first Inaugural in 1933 is remembered for the line "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself." This was actually a bit of inspired nonsense; if you're worried about putting food on the table, that's a fear of something more than fear itself. Instead, FDR's more important line was "action and action now." He used the word "act" or "action" six times in the speech.

It's not a coincidence that in his interview with "60 Minutes," Obama also stressed the importance of immediate action. And he made reference to experimenting with different policies, an echo of FDR's 1932 speech—ghosted by a reporter—in which he said: "The country needs and, unless I mistake its temper, the country demands bold, persistent experimentation. It is common sense to take a method and try it. If it fails, admit it frankly"—a novel concept in the Bush era—"and try another. But above all, try something." This became the watchword of the New Deal.

Any Economic speech Obama makes for the next three to four years is going to contain the words "Action" as surely as he draws a breath. But with respect to Congressman Frank, there can't be any action until it's really on the President-Elect's shoulders...

UPDATE (9:44am Pacific): Jed has some thoughts as well...