Obama names new White House budget chief

CHICAGO: President-elect Barack Obama on Tuesday named Peter Orszag to head up the White House's Office of Management and Budget with the daunting task of eliminating billions in wasteful government spending.

Orszag, a 39-year-old graduate of Princeton and the London School of Economics, is now the director of the Congressional Budget Office, a non-partisan agency that offers budget advice to US lawmakers.

In a statement, Obama said that at a time of rising deficits and a slumping economy, budget reform was not an option but an "imperative."

"We cannot sustain a system that bleeds billions of taxpayer dollars on programs that have outlived their usefulness, or exist solely because of the power of a politician, lobbyist, or interest group," the Democrat said.

"That is why I will ask my team to think anew and act anew to meet our new challenges," he said.

"We will go through our federal budget - page by page, line by line - eliminating those programs we don't need, and insisting that those we do operate in a sensible cost-effective way."

Obama, who takes office on January 20, also named Rob Nabors to serve as Orszag's deputy. Nabors is currently staff director of the powerful appropriations committee in the House of Representatives.

At a news conference here, Obama said the pair were "outstanding public servants."

The appointments fleshed out Obama's economic team a day after he nominated New York central banker Timothy Geithner to be his Treasury secretary and named ex-Treasury chief Larry Summers as his top economic adviser.