Jon, you are absolutely right in your analysis. In Obama's speech in Springfield, Illinois, commemorating the 200th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln's birthday, he used the example of Lincoln to counter the philosophy of Reagan. It was a brilliant speech. He spoke of Lincoln's emphasis of the importance of the Union.

To paraphrase, Lincoln argued for self-reliance and independence, but he said that the purpose of government was to do things that the people could not do for themselves -- a direct refutation to Reagan/Friedman's assertion that "government is the problem".

Steve Roach, the head of the Asia department for Morgan Stanley, said that China could no longer rely on its export market and must build a safety net for its citizens so that they would feel comfortable spending. The lack of a safety net in China is one thing that forces people to save for health care and for retirement.

The same advice applies to the U.S. as well: We can no longer expect that consumption will account for 70% of the GDP. Consumption will have to decline, and savings/investment will have to replace the reduction in aggregate demand. We can / will increase taxes and invest the money in health care, education, infrastructure.

The Republicans appear to have decided to go down with the good ship U.S.S. Reagan, as it sinks to the bottom of the ocean.

"it should dawn on you that in one month President Obama has secured twice the investment in the things progressives care about than Bill Clinton did in eight years."

What a wonderful magician and leader that Obama is. How extraordinary. Of course the one month he is in power has no resemblance to any of the preceding months in 16 or 30 or 50 years has nothing to do with it. Obama has secured. Dang he is good. Superhuman really.

The Clinton comparison seems unfair and a little petty. I had beefs with Clinton too but, come on... Obama's reputation does not need to be made at Clinton's expense. I doubt Obama thinks that way.

A thousand thanks Jon Taplin for shining a ray of light on what is a very dark and nebulous moment. Amidst all the chari vari and distortion, it is hard to glean a clear picture of exactly what solutions are possible because we are under water in stormy seas. Everything is salty and blurred. Our primary focus is the next breath, and we are flaylinig frantically for life lines, or anything that floats.

I view Obama's economic team with dread concern. They are all predator class Wall Street insiders who are responsible for the greatest economic crisis since the depression, and who are focused on bailing out their cronies and select oligarchs, and heaping all the costs, burdens, pain, and imponderable debt on the shoulders of America's children.

Perhaps Obama has a stealthy plan for the long-term. One can only hope. But you remind us there is indeed some positive progress on progressive issues and policies that has been achieved in a very short time by our new President.

Bravo! Now dismantle the failing banks, fire their management, and start constructing an economic model and rigorously regulated financial system for the 21st Century that operates on sound ecnomics and not gambling strategies and PONZI scheme, and does not benefit the predator class alone!

American politics has devolved into aburdist comedy. The gop acted in totally partisan ways, following their porcine drug addicted prophet rush and the allholy joetheplummer admonishing their lockstep followers to channel Obama's failure, ruthlessly obstructed a stimulus package targeted at the poor and middle class Americans, proselytized the FAILED policies of the last eight years squawking endlessly for taxcuts, taxcuts, taxcuts,taxcuts, taxcuts, taxcuts, taxcuts, squawk squawk squawk, shiving Obama at every turn, and Obama's futile attempts at bipartisanship, outreach, inclusion, and reconciliation - and then have muster the utter gall and laughable hypocrisy to brute complaints of the lack or bipartsianship.

The complict parrots and message-force multipliers in the socalled MSM dutifully regurgitate the hypocrital, and pathologically deceptive babel on TV ad infinitum. After all the wailing and gnashing of teeth, the gop is left with it's own irrelevance and no hand in the stimulus package. They are praying like demons that the stimulus package fails, - but if there is any improvement in the lives of poor and middle class Americans and the majority of Americans who voted for Obama, - these hollow, childish, and hypocrital blandishments will be the ropes in which they hang themselves.

Goodbye gop, and good riddance. You have sealed your fitting fate.

Facing the considerable future way is worth a wealth of looking back as your theme alludes to Jon

"My guess is that the economy will be firmly on the road to recovery in the fall of 2010 ..."

I plan to be a real stickler and hopefully remember to remind folk of predictions like this one. Maybe it will be true, but the GLOBAL nature of the economic crisis, and its depth, suggest to me that we may be in for some tougher times than just a quickie recession. My own "guess" (and I understand that Jon Taplin is, like me, just making an educated guess) is that Obama will have to quite sharply change his approach and pursue a very different kind of spending program, one involving such measures as nationalization/"supervised workouts" of banks, possible fed stock ownership of controlling shares in the big three auto manufacturers, and a full-throated commitment to what I call 'eco-industrialization'. The latter refers to an overall transformation of the economy, centered on but not limited to massive and probably largely publicly funded (as well as subsidized) development of clean energy sources (wind,solar, hydrogen -- the latter manufactured and stored, often in salt form [like MgH2] using energy from wind, solar or other alternative energies) transformation of the economy to one that is sustainable. This massive project could play the role that WWII played in getting the US and later the world out of depression, but the problem is that it requires political foresight, rather than accidental development.

I am less optimistic than the author of the column that this will happen soon enough (ecologically) or that the economy will be 'firmly' on the road to economic recovery by fall 2010. But who knows?