It’s not that we thought he’d give bad advice: rather the opposite, in fact. I’d known Goolsbee since 2001, first as my professor at the University of Chicago, and then as an economist whom I interviewed. He was a sound economist, refreshingly independent, and intellectually honest. But those qualities seemed more like liabilities than assets in Washington.

Our suspicions seemed to be confirmed in February 2008, when a Canadian television network reported that an Obama adviser, whom ABC later identified as Goolsbee, had told Canadian diplomats that Obama was stepping up the rhetoric on NAFTA, and said, “It’s just campaign rhetoric … It’s not serious.” Everyone had already suspected as much, of course, but Goolsbee seemed to have made the un-Washingtonian mistake of saying out loud what everyone else was uncomfortably thinking.

Goolsbee’s decision to step down in August after 11 months as head of the council (after joining it in March 2009) and return to his professorship in Chicago was greeted by sniping and sniffs. One Fox online headline crowed, “Obama’s Top Economic Adviser Jumps the Sinking Ship.” The Huffington Post argued that Goolsbee “has often taken positions that have failed to carry the day, or he has ratcheted down his prescriptions from the outset.” Even The Economist, generally a fan, admitted: “Goolsbee’s tenure as chairman has been a thankless one.”

Thankless, perhaps—but Goolsbee’s stature as Obama’s longest-serving economics adviser is in fact a fairly remarkable testament to him, and to his president. Christina Romer, the first person to chair Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers, had done major work on economic stimulus and other questions that became very important at the height of the crisis. Goolsbee’s contributions are less obvious—but that doesn’t mean they have been less important. Pundits on the outside may ask what specific initiatives he pushed, but that is not how Goolsbee describes his position. “I always felt my role was like the pit crew in a Nascar race and President Obama was Dale Jr.—he’s driving, and my job is to change the tires and get him back on the road.”

People who have worked with Goolsbee do not talk about the fierce policy battles that he waged; they praise his flair for asking questions that get at the heart of the matter, his self-deprecating humor, his talent for “disagreeing without being disagreeable,” and his commitment to making sure that the president understood all possible angles before he made a decision. “He’s got no agenda,” says Valerie Jarrett, a senior adviser to Obama. “He’s respectful, but he tells the president exactly what he thinks, and he’s not shy about telling the other members of the economic team what he thinks.” Of course, advisers are always nice about other advisers—on the record. Then again, no one has ever tried to convince me, on the record or off, that Larry Summers didn’t have an agenda.