NY Times (USA)
Toxic Reaction

The joy of blogs are that you can be as vitriolic as you like… The NY Times takes the best of the business and politics blogs on Timothy Geithner's plan...

‘The zombie ideas have won’
‘Geithner isn't Michael Brown, he’s Hurricane Katrina’
‘The plan is yet another massive, ineffective gift to banks and Wall Street’

It’s been a strictly adverse reaction. Some of the plan was leaked as early as Friday evening and the NY Times says economist and nobel prizewinner Paul Krugman was the first to post his personal ‘despair’ as early as 7.10am on the Saturday. Respected Krugman says Geithner is repackaging the same idea he has failed to get approved so far. And he says it simply won’t work.

South China Morning Post (China)
Toxic assets scheme clears hurdle

Reaction from China on Tilmothy Geithner’s plan is, according to the South China Morning Post, positive, going so far as to say it gets ‘a vote of confidence’. China is the biggest holder of US government debt. China says it will continue to buy US debt and still considers US treasuries a low risk investment.

Times UK (UK)
China challenges power of the dollar as it flexes its economic muscles

However, over in The Times in the UK, a more menacing angle from China is discussed. A statement published on the People’s Bank of China website said the ‘dollar’s role could eventually be taken over by the IMF’s so-called Special Drawing Right, a quasi currency that was created in 1969’. The article says the statement highlights China’s growing confidence as the West buckles under recession, calling it 'audacious timing', a week before the G20. China says the dollar’s reserve status has allowed Amercicans to live beyond their means and therefore allowed imbalances in the global economy.

Washington Post
Conservative Group Hammers Obama on AIG

AIG has been causing Obama a headache for some time now. The latest is that nine of the 10 executives who received top bonuses from the US insurance giant have agreed to return them, according to the New York attorney general. That amounts to about half of the 165 million dollars paid out in bonuses by AIG after the government/taxpayer bailout. But the action comes too late for the AIP (American Issues Project), the same conservative group who took out adverts during the presidential election campaign linking Obama to William Ayers. They now plan to spend 500,000 dollars on TV ads slamming the president over the AIG bonus scandal

Le Figaro (France)
Le Président Obama s’entretiendra demain par téléphone avec Nicolas Sarkozy (President Obama ready for phone call with Nicolas Sarkozy)

The cover of the Figaro is on Obama and Sarkozy’s scheduled phone call to discuss G20 issues ahead of the summit in London on April 2nd.
 
In fact it’ll be a video conference call, illustrated here by a photo of them both chatting away. Sarkozy’s phone call with Obama will be the second since the latter’s election as president. While they met before Obama was elected, Sarkozy has yet to congratulate Obama face to face and will do so at the G20.

Liberation (France)
"Le potager des Obama creuse le sillon du bio" (The Obamas dig out their organic veg patch)

Great photo of Michelle Obama in the gardens of the White House in Liberation.. there wont be any beetroot in her patch – her husband doesn’t like them.. but there will be plenty of roquette.

The article talks about how this photo of Michelle Obama, brandishing a pitch fork and flexing her muscles, has led Maureen Dowd in the NY Times to ask if maybe the wrong Obama is behind the desk in the White House…

The Guardian (UK)

Politics in spades: why the Obama veg patch matters

Over in the UK, the Guardian tells how Michelle’s gardening - far from being a novelty - makes her the latest in a long line of passionate White House occupants with green fingers.

Apparently George Washington missed his garden so much he gave up on a third term… and cows grazed in the grounds of the White House during Thomas Jefferson’s presidency. Jefferson also ranked the introduction of olive trees to the US alongside his writing of the declaration of Independence when judging his services to the country.