WASHINGTON, Dec 8 (AFP) - US Treasury Secretary John Snow, a faithful backer of President George W. Bush, defied predictions of his ejection Wednesday by clinging to his cabinet job.
Calm and discreet, the 65-year-old Snow is a sharp contrast to his straight-talking predecessor Paul O' Neill, who quit with rancour, later contributing to a book titled "The Price of Loyalty" which painted a damning picture of the Bush government.
In the months running up to the November 2 election, Snow, a former railroad executive, proved his loyalty -- one of the highest-prized assets in the administration -- with a slew of trips around the country, almost every one to a battleground state.
His statements regularly credited Bush's huge tax cuts with stimulating the economy and job creation.
That work may have paid off now, proving wrong a New York Times report on Monday, which quoted a White House official saying "a firm decision" had been made to ditch Snow.
Earlier, the New York paper quoted an administration official as saying the treasury secretary could stay "as long as he wants, provided it is not very long."
Instead, Snow now stays in the cabinet charged with selling Bush's economic priorities: overhauling Social Security by allowing individuals to set up private retirement accounts and reforming the taxation system to make it simpler.
"He has been a good soldier, unlike O'Neill who the Bush administration felt was fighting them along the way. Snow has accepted his role, which is to be more of a salesman, less of a policy developer," said Ethan Harris, Lehman Brothers chief US economist.
Snow was sworn in February 3, 2003 to bring the Treasury Department back "on message" in selling the administration's tax-cut policy. He fulfilled that mission, getting a 350-billion-dollar, second round of tax cuts through Congress in 2003.
The father of three, who also holds a doctorate in economics from the University of Virginia, as well as a law degree from George Washington University, quickly gave the markets a start, however.
A month after taking office, he triggered a wave of worldwide dollar selling by telling reporters that he was "not particularly concerned" about a decline in the dollar.
Since then, the story has been similar, with markets now entrenched in the view that Snow has a policy of benign neglect about the dollar's slump despite his rote-like repetition of a statement that the United States is sticking to a "strong-dollar policy."
In early 2003, the euro broke through the 1.10-dollar barrier for the first time in four years. This week, the European currency rose to an unprecedented 1.3467 dollars.
"The strong dollar policy is a charade," Harris said.
A onetime official at the department of transportation with a background in economics and law, Snow had previously served as chairman and chief executive of railroad giant CSX Corp., the largest rail freight network in the eastern United States.
12/08/2004 21:28 GMT - AFP