Obama unveils his economic team

12:27 PM: Obama pledged more “transparency and accountability” for the government’s rescue efforts under his administration.

12:18 PM: Obama called on the next Congress to put together an economic stimulus plan in January; he also promised to unveil proposals from his economic team in the next few weeks. Obama also acknowledged that any government stimulus plan could require cuts to other government programs:

We’ll have to scour our federal budget, line by line, and make meaningful cuts and sacrifices.

12:10 PM: Not that it was much of a secret, but now it’s official. The president-elect just finished his speech at a press conference at the Chicago Hilton. His picks:

• New York Federal Reserve president Timothy Geithner will be his pick for Treasury secretary;
• Harvard professor and former Clinton Treasury secretary Lawrence Summers will head the National Economic Council;
• Christina Romer will chair the Council of Economic Advisers;
• Melody Barnes will direct the Domestic Policy Council.

The new Treasury secretary will have two big tasks: First, adding some transparency to the government’s trillions of dollars worth of bailouts, which have been kept very secretive by current Treasury secretary Henry Paulson; and second, reforming the nation’s failed financial regulators.