Obama Expands Ron Bloom’s Power, Appoints Him Manufacturing Czar.

Like millions of other Americans President Barack Obama was at work on Labor Day, although a picnic was amongst his plans.

He was due to attend a worker’s picnic in Cincinnati, Ohio and at that event he was scheduled to announce the appointment of Ron Bloom to the post of “Manufacturing Czar”.

Bloom is already a member of the Obama administration as he is a Senior Advisor to treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, serving as a member of the “President’s Task Force on the Automotive Industry”. Apparently he will continue in this capacity in addition to his new duties.

Bloom was a key member of the team who negotiated both the auto industry “bailout” while negotiating a restructuring plan with both auto industry executives and labor unions. He also helped engineer a plan to restructure the US steel industry when he was privately employed as a vice president at Lazard Freres & Co. LLC. It is believed that in his new role he will be working with the Departments of Commerce, Treasury, Energy, and Labor as well as the National Economic Council.

In a statement released Monday President Obama said “Last week we learned that our manufacturing sector expanded for the first time in 18 months and had the highest monthly output in two years. It’s a sign that we’re on the right track to economic recovery, but that we still have a long way to go. That’s why I’ve asked Ron Bloom to help coordinate my Administration’s manufacturing policy.”

The appointment comes as political pundits are still speculating that the President had a hand in the resignation of Van Jones, something that White House advisor David Axelrod denied on Obama’s behalf during a Sunday appearance on “Meet the Press”. "Absolutely not -- this was Van Jones' own decision," he told host David Gregory. Jones resigned after it surfaced that he had been a signatory on a petition that called for an investigation into whether or not the government allowed the 2001 9/11 terrorist attacks to occur.

Van Jones was often referred to as the “czar for green jobs” and his exit has led some republicans to call for a halt to the appointment of any more “czars” until the thirty in place have both their credentials and previous political experience examined in detail. By appointing Ron Bloom just a few days after Jones’ abrupt resignation the president is obviously demonstrating that he has no intention to bow to such outside pressure when it comes to staffing and running his administration.