> The thing is, focusing on the beginning is what Marv and I have been doing
from the get-go. But, even more than that, my interpretation of your
point is that it is even more critical of Obama and his admin than we
were being. We argued that he understood it but - good liberal
neoliberal he is - thought he could address it with bipartisanship and
compromise. A problem parallel to the old guy atop the fed not
believing that corporate leaders could be so irresponsible - Obama:
"Surely, the Republicans have to be willing to work together to solve
things for the country."
Your argument is that - all the staggering amounts of evidence to the contrary notwithstanding - he had no idea how serious things were. I don't buy it, mostly because its inconceivable to me that the mounting, serially mutually reinforcing, and international implosions of Sept, Oct, Nov, Dec of 2008 and January, 2009 could be seen as a blip, a glitch, a needed correction. But maybe I give him more credit than he deserves...
^^^^^^^^^ CB: Let's be clear. You and Marv are a lot more naive than Obama, and he has a lot more experience with the Congress and American voters than you do. Obama didn't have any choice but to try get support from right Dems and Reps. Don't you get that yet ? ! That's American political reality 2010. The right has succeeded in making "liberal" a curse word. Government _spending_ , stupidly, is in bad repute with tens of millions of Americans. You can ignore that because all you have to do is write about it. Obama can't ignore that reality. He has to try to make a silk purse out of sow's ear.
Furthermore, good social dems that you are you still can't be sure that even a larger stimulus would have changed the election result.