Monday, February 16, 2009

Obama's delicate balancing act tomorrow

Tomorrow, President Barack Obama signs into law what he considers a shining accomplishment for his administration -- an economic stimulus bill that will spend less than a quarter of the money in it over the next two years.

People need help now. So such a minor payoff does not seem to match the "catastrophe" description Obama used to describe the nation if his plan did not pass.

So now he faces a delicate balance. His aides on Sunday's political TV news shows were busy downplaying how much of an immediate impact the plan would provide to turn around the economy, or even stem its fall.

But tomorrow Obama must toast his accomplishment as the kind of help the American people have asked for. Yet I don't believe they asked for only a quarter of the possible help for the next two years.

Obama will be in full spin mode tomorrow with his rhetoric on high. He'll be able to fool the American people tomorrow. But it will be increasingly hard in the months to come when the stimulus does not nothing of the sort.

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