A stimulus mistake?
Much of the details of the new stimulus have yet to be known. What's emerging so far is cause for concern. For one thing, the $300 billion in tax cuts may be smart politics, but it's questionable economics and policy. Then there's the issue of how federal dollars might be used to prime the pump, with so much going to backfill basic programs being defunded by cash-strapped states, and lobbyists of the powerful highway-sprawl consortium lining up for the "roads and bridges" money.
George W. Bush and eight years of Republican misrule — really more than a quarter century — are leaving the new administration with the worst mess in nearly 80 years. And remember, all this was validated over and over by a majority of Americans at the polls (maybe not in 2000 and 2004). It's an open question whether any president can lead the changes really necessary to address the Great Disruption, of which the economic collapse is only part. We'll see. But the barriers to real change we can believe in are mammoth.
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