The Post today has a polling story about how confidence in the president's economic stimulus legislation has dropped from 59 to 52 percent; the piece never really discusses why people might feel that way except to mention rising unemployment numbers. But perhaps it has something to do with the fact that much of the stimulus funding is still going out the door and is yet to be spent.
If you recall the Bush stimulus from spring of 2008, it's strongest effect was felt in the third quarter of that year when it led to a modest rise in GDP growth. In an article yesterday that touched on concerns about unemployment, Christina Romer, chair of the Council of Economic Advisers, said, "There will be big increases in stimulus spending in the fall and early next year. We have to wait to see what happens with that." Ultimately, public opinion right now only matters insofar as confidence is important to economic recovery, but that's not the right way to judge the stimulus. That's also a separate debate from whether or not the stimulus was too small (answer: probably) but it's still too early -- only four months after the law was passed -- to judge this massive investment strategy.
One other funny paragraph from the Post article:
One factor that continues to work for Obama, however, is that most Americans still see him as a new type of Democrat, one "who will be careful with the public's money," rather than an old-style, "tax-and-spend Democrat." By this point in 1993, Clinton had lost the new-style label, which he had maintained over the first months of his presidency.
Beyond the weird idea that Clinton, who brought you the balanced budget, had for some brief period in 1993 "lost" that label, how long exactly are Democrats going to be the party of fiscal responsibility before the media catches on? In the past two decades, nearly every Democrat of national prominence has been of this "new type," while the various Republican candidates have espoused an economic strategy predicated on tax cuts that lead to deficits and debt. That's what Grover Norquist's tax pledge means. The Democrats re-adopted PAY GO rules in 2007 that the Republicans had thrown by the wayside for years. It boggles my mind that a party can stand for something for 20 years and still have it considered "new" by the press.
-- Tim Fernholz
