By: Victoria McGrane

 What is Ways and Means Chairman Charlie Rangel looking for in the next Treasury Secretary?

“Him sharing with me whether [Henry] Paulson makes any sense at all,” the New York Democrat said when a reporter asked him that very question.

Rangel harshly critiqued the current Treasury secretary’s performance in the current crisis – comments that show just how far Paulson’s star has fallen in Democratic circles.

“It would seem to me that the decisions that he made – makes for the country and therefore the free world are based on his experiences,” mentioning Paulson’s long career at former investment bank Goldman Sachs. “And I don’t see where the guy that’s having his home foreclosed or the persons that are losing their jobs or health benefits are on the Secretary’s agenda at all. And when I say at all, I mean at all.”

“He really doesn’t believe that that is his job at all” to help average Americans, Rangel told reporters at a Thursday briefing. Paulson thinks “that his job is to stabilize the fiscal institutions.”

Rangel said he hopes Obama’s Treasury pick – who Rangel will work closely with on health and tax measures – will give him more confidence that he and his colleagues did the right thing in supporting the $700 billion bailout package Paulson urged them to pass.

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