Delaware Liberal

I’ve heard this a million times now and I simply don’t understand it. In terms of chronology, Obama did put the economy first. With TARP and the stimulus and the auto-bailout, the key measures to shore up a flat-lining economy were taken in short order. You could plausibly argue, I think, that in retrospect, Obama should have gone bigger, and produced a much more ambitious stimulus. But, as someone who observed this close-up and in real time, the odds of that actually happening were close to zero. And if it had happened, the stimulus would have been even less popular – and more easily demagogued – than it actually was. The problem was not the timing or the seriousness of the response; it was the seriousness of the problem. When an economy has a near-death experience, on top of huge public and private debt, the recovery will tend to be exactly what this recovery was: long, sad at first, and later … well, we don’t know yet, do we?

Sens. Tom Coburn and Mary Landrieu gave their farewell addresses on the Senate floor Thursday and were praised by colleagues. Coburn gave an emotional address about the power of individual senators and the importance of compromise and oversight. He praised Sen. Tom Carper, who chairs the Senate Homeland Security Committee where Coburn is ranking member. “He has been a phenomenal chairman. … We do not agree on everything, but the one thing we agreed on was that we were going to work together to solve problems.” Carper returned the praise, citing the movement of cyber bills and others as a testament to his work. “Legislation is moving through this body and through the House this week — it is pretty amazing, — to strengthen our cyber defenses,” Carper said.