Matt Yglesias has found two telling employment charts showing the impact of Obama's policies.
The first shows the first Obama stimulus stopped the plunging employment recession, and the second shows how the original Obama stimulus was not enough to make a recovery in total employment.
In both graphs you can clearly see Obama policies had an impact, but if you look at the chart tracking the rate of change in employment you can see why they might be willing to let further stimulus slide into the next election cycle, even though the second graph tracking total employment clearly shows that the work is nowhere near complete.
As long as the rate of change in employment is on a positive track but Republicans outright block any further measures, Obama is not going to go enraging constitutionalists by making extraordinary efforts to enact stimulus - the record is clear that his policies work, and that we need more of them.
IT SUCKS that we're not gonna get more stimulus, even though we clearly need it, but whose fault is that - really.
But the person who really has decisions to make based on this information is Ben Bernanke. The latest statements from the Fed waffle a bit from the earlier commitment to maintain inflationary policy for an extended period - now he's trying to reconcile a bit with Fed members who have rabid hatreds for inflation.
I'm really not sure what more the Fed can do on its own, without the help of Congressional fiscal policy and stimulus spending - the Fed rate is near-0 and QE3 is underway, they are printing money at full steam to push recovery from the monetary perspective.
But considering Allen Greenspan had such an impact on fiscal attitude and policy that people now mistake the very act of a Fed Chairman speaking for Fed policy in action, I think it's fair to accuse Bernanke of taking that positive rate of change trend as an excuse to sit on his haunches and make friends, instead of pushing the damn envelope.
CONGRESS NEEDS TO SPEND.
AGGREGATE DEMAND.