From WNYC in New York, this is NPR's On the Media.

I'm Brooke Gladstone.

And I'm Bob Garfield.

This week, the White House focused on pitching its new plan for economic recovery.

Last time they tried this hard was in early February when Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner unveiled the administration's proposal for dealing with the toxic assets plaguing financial institutions.

His performance was not electrifying.

...funding mechanism that uses capital from the Treasury as a bridge to private capital.

Both the plan which lacked specifics and Geithner, who lacked VIM, were given two thumbs down by the media and the stock market, which tanked.

So this week, the White House went a different route.

Geithner explained his plan to reporters in a pen and pad chat, no TV cameras allowed.

CNN's Jessica Yellen was there, and she said it was probably for the best.

He is not a person who exudes confidence.

He looks like an overgrown prep school student who's coming before the administration

board because they broke the honor code.

Oh, my goodness.

He sort of sits there kind of cowering back.

It's just his style.

Keeping Geithner off camera may have helped.

The Dow shot up almost 7%.

But still, the cameras were waiting, and someone who does exude confidence had to pitch the plan to the American people.

Enter the president, pitching on the Tonight Show at the end of last week, 60

minutes over the weekend, a primetime press conference on Tuesday, a digital town hall. Peter Nicholas,

...