James Forsyth James Forsyth

Douglas Alexander attacks Obama’s regulatory chief

Douglas Alexander has a piece over at LabourList trying to claim Barack Obama for Labour. But Alexander needs to do his research better, as in his piece he attacks the man Obama has picked to overhaul the entire US regulatory system.

Alexander writes:

“As I argued recently in the Telegraph, David Cameron, like John McCain, finds himself stranded in the wrong place because you can’t privatise, deregulate or even nudge your way out of a global financial crisis.”

Now, the problem with this is that the co-author of Nudge is Cass Sunstein who Obama has appointed to head the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. Sunstein, a former colleague and close friend of Obama, is charged with reforming the whole US regulatory system.

Alexander is so keen to attack Nudge because Sunstein’s co-author, Richard Thaler, is extremely close to George Osborne’s office. But he really should have known about Sunstein’s friendship with Obama and his new role in the Obama administration. 

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