WASHINGTON: He is not officially on the job but the snowballing economic crisis makes United States President-elect Barack Obama look like he is already in charge.

On Monday, Mr Obama vowed to 'jolt' the economy back to health with a large new stimulus package, as he introduced the key members of his economic Cabinet.

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On Tuesday, he was facing the cameras again, this time declaring his intention to cut billions of dollars in wasteful spending while naming an aide to run the White House budget office.

Yesterday, he addressed his countrymen in a third consecutive news conference, promising to implement a plan to bolster growth on 'day one'.

He also announced a new economic advisory panel to bring in a fresh perspective to policymaking and named former Federal Reserve chairman Paul Volcker, 81, as its chief.

Transitions from one president to the next are usually quiet, behind-the-scene affairs, with the man in the wings making but a few public pronouncements during the interval, mostly to name his Cabinet picks.

This time it is different.

'Obama's transition is proving to be truly unique,' said Professor Lewis Wolfson of American University. 'The current administration has taken a piecemeal approach to the economy and at times, President Bush has seemed to be out of the picture.

'So Obama has had to step in. It is central to reassuring the American people who feel the effects of the crisis personally but do not really understand what the hundreds of billions committed to bailout add up to. It is up to him to explain to them what is happening and why certain things have to be done. No one else has that connection.

'In effect, we have two presidents at a time,' he added.

Mr Obama has insisted otherwise and kept a low profile in the first few weeks after the Nov 4 election. He stayed away from the Group of 20 leaders' summit called by Mr George W. Bush and turned down requests to meet the visiting leaders to avoid undercutting the current administration's relevance.

His appearances this week were a response to the needs of the economy, he said, when asked if he had had to step in sooner and to a greater degree than he had planned and how he squared that with his assertion of there being only one president at a time.

'Given the extraordinary circumstances that we find ourselves in...I think it is very important for the American people to understand that we are putting together a first-class team and for them to have clarity that we don't intend to stumble into the next administration.

'We are going to hit the ground running.'

But he would still not be drawn into the nitty-gritty, refusing to say just how large the stimulus package would be or how it would be paid for. His aides and congressional Democrats have predicted a price tag of as much as US$700 billion (S$1 trillion).

'It's going to be costly,' was all he said, noting that even conservative economists agreed it would take a massive intervention to swerve the economy away from depression.

Some presidential transitions have been marked by distrust and at times outright rancour.

Former president Franklin D. Roosevelt, taking over in 1933, rejected his lame-duck predecessor Herbert Hoover's suggestion for a joint response to the Great Depression.

By the time of his inauguration in 1953, Dwight Eisenhower and then-president Harry Truman had exchanged plenty of hostile words.

The Bush administration has seen value in fostering a link with the incoming president and offered him the kind of cooperation that is being remarked at.

'We are working hand-in-glove with them,' White House spokesman Dana Perino said on Tuesday, after Mr Bush informed Mr Obama of his intent to bail out stricken financial services giant Citigroup.

Mr Obama confirmed there was a congruency in the approach. 'My commitment is to do what's required so that our financial system works and credit flows. President Bush has indicated that he has the same approach, the same attitude.'

But he also drew a line of distinction from the Bush administration, stressing repeatedly that his proposals would bring relief to lower-income and middle-class families, not just big financial institutions. 'We cannot have a thriving Wall Street without a thriving Main Street, that in this country we rise or fall as one nation, as one people.'

The man accused of 'measuring the drapes' before his election is now not being seen as presumptuous before his inauguration on Jan 20.

bhagya@sph.com.sg