Monday, and let's look at what the pundits are saying now.
Paul Krugman:
I don’t believe that even America’s economic efforts are adequate, but they’re far more than most other wealthy countries have been willing to undertake. And by rights this week’s G-20 summit ought to be an occasion for Mr. Obama to chide and chivy European leaders, in particular, into pulling their weight.
But these days foreign leaders are in no mood to be lectured by American officials, even when — as in this case — the Americans are right.
The financial crisis has had many costs. And one of those costs is the damage to America’s reputation, an asset we’ve lost just when we, and the world, need it most.
More on Krugman
Evan Thomas (2009): He's brilliant, but prefers the gadfly role to the insider.
Nicholas Confessore (2002): He's brilliant, but prefers the gadfly role to the insider.
And everything else
Nolan Finley:
Newspapers may go away, but the scoundrels won't.
David Ignatius: Dick Cheney has weakened this country and Obama is doing a good job, but Robert Gibbs was "gratuitously disrespectful and partisan" and that's of course, what really matters to the Villagers. Let that be an important lesson to you, boys and girls, from the Serious People. If you ruin the country, be sure to be respectful and polite (and, if at all possible, bipartisan) about it.
Jay Cost: Someone's got to pay for the economy. Could be Obama and the Dems. But in any case, the fight's not over.
Jonathan Alter:
Caught in the Act Of Thinking
Love that headline. Should happen more often to a government near you.
But if the public wasn't gambling last fall (John McCain was arguably the riskier choice), the president is now. Obama is tripling down, wagering not just that his recovery plan will work but that he can simultaneously dent three huge problems (not fix, dent) that keep getting worse. He's telling the people exactly what to expect from him for the duration of his presidency. He's insisting that repairing the nation's "foundation" begins right now, in this year's budget. And he's set himself up for failure if he doesn't bring big changes in our new policy trinity of Health, Energy and Education, or what I lamely think of as HEE-HEE (constant repetition being necessary for the priorities to sink in).
Norm Orenstein:
I have watched with interest the reactions to the president's proposal in his budget to reduce to 28 percent the deduction for charitable contributions for those in the top tax bracket. Much of the opposition has come from the charitable community, but there have been several op/eds and other reports from conservative economists and others suggesting that it would result in a serious hit to charities. Which has raised for me a question: if President Obama had instead suggested tax reform that would reduce the top marginal tax rate to 28 percent, how many think that there would be comparable conservative objections because of the havoc that would wreak on charitable institutions? Go ahead, raise your hands. Anybody?