President Barack Obama nominated Jack Lew to replace outgoing Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner on Thursday, making sure to get in a friendly jab at his current chief of staff's peculiar signature.
"I'd never noticed Jack's signature, and when this was highlighted yesterday in the press I considered rescinding my offer to appoint him," Obama said during his announcement from the East Room of the White House. "Jack assured me that he is going to work to make at least one letter legible in order not to debase our currency should he be confirmed as secretary of the treasury."
Lew's signature looks like a haphazard series of loops bearing little resemblance to any of the actual letters that make up his name. The media has jumped on his bizarre scrawl, speculating that Lew may actually have to undergo remedial work on his John Hancock to make it pretty enough to grace our legal tender. Geithner made similar improvements when he took the reins at treasury.
Of course, the aesthetics of Lew's signature will be almost entirely inconsequential if he's eventually confirmed as treasury secretary. The Associated Press runs down some of Lew's more important credentials:
[Lew] is a premier federal budget expert who would take the helm of the government's main agency for economic and fiscal policy just as the administration girds itself for a new confrontation with congressional Republicans over the nation's debt and deficits.
Support HuffPost
Already contributed? Log in to hide these messages.