The Economists Vote for Obama's Plan

Let's remember these last two days as one of the few moments President Obama broke through the clouds and changed the conversation on the economy. Today he took his case to Richmond, Ricky Cantor's district. Earlier this morning Cantor told Politico that he wished the President would not take his plan to the public.

Amazingly, Democrats remained coherent behind their talking points and union after union individually issued their support. Compare this to the Right's incoherence in their reactions, which were all over the map. Someone didn't mail out their talking points this morning.

Several non-partisan think tanks crunched the numbers on the plan and depending on the results showed that it could generate from 1.9 million to 4 million jobs through 2012. When Moody's weighed in with its support, Republican House members started waffling, saying maybe they could cooperate on infrastructure spending. Don't hold your breath.

Obviously, President Obama captured the day when the Washington Post Television critic gave him rave reviews and Obama-hater Lou Dobbs called the speech the "best the President has ever given--" a real stemwinder."

Focus groups of swing voters in Cantor's district responded overwhelmingly positive to all the President's proposals. They measured this while they watched the speech with those great dials that registered approval and disapproval.

Dana Milbank captured the congressional response during the speech--the derisive laugh from Republicans and that the only standing ovation the President got from the Republicans was on the Free Trade Agreements. He said that when Abraham Lincoln isn't applauded by Republicans, you know the President's in trouble.

Milbank forgets there were two audiences==the Rich,who were the live audience, and the rest of America, who were home watching. Every one of those congressional viewers is wealthy. None of them have been affected by the last few years in the least. The Republicans know the unemployed don't vote for them so a terrible economy is terrific for them. In fact that's why they are deliberately sabotaging it.

One blogger photo-shopped a bumper sticker with the Republican logo that said,"While millions are out of work, we're trying to get one man out of a job."

Today, the White House deserves alot of credit in how it handled the inevitable questions of what is negotiatiable and what the President will compromise on. Their answer was that the bill would be submitted as a whole and the urge Congress to vote on it up and down. They refused to say anything was on the table. A remakable change from the past and I think a good strategy.

I'm not willing to say it's dead on arrival. None of the pundits here believe it stands a chance of passing. But let's see the response.

But the President's ability to generate pressure on this will be muted because of the Republican high holy day 9/11. Already we have former President Bush claiming credit for getting bin Laden and Dick Cheney will be allowed on The View without a parole officer. And we have wall to wall coverage of that dreadful day.

I am going to be off Planet for the weekend and I'm sorry I lack the appropriate feelings for 9/11. It was a disgraceful failure by our political elites and government agencies. Richard Armitage called 9/11--the day history started. And its aftermath led to too many self-inflicted wounds to feel anything but profound sadness about what we willingly did to our own country, let alone others. I feel sorry for a younger generation who will not know the freedoms of the past or the economic opportunities of my own generation. It is a day when America started to worship Death and this has colored our attitudes every since.

My own memories of 9/11 are too scattershot to make sense of that beautiful day. I think of Rumson, New Jersey, the well-to-do shore town which lost proportionately more lives than any American town with its commuter population. I think of the fact that for a few weeks for the first time in my life America actually loved New York City,which was usually portrayed as the seat of liberalism and media culture. I think of the emergency vehicles here in Alexandria streaming to the Pentagon. I think of having a visiting delegation of African diplomats holed up at the Willard Hotel unable to even walk outside. I think of yuppie parents visitng my wife concerned about whether her school made preparations for terrorist attacks. And I think of the photographic images of the twisted metal and dust, which still have a ghoulish beauty.

I guess in the words of President Obama's predecessor, "we should just go shopping." Don't forget the Duct Tape. I expect we will have Hallmark Greeting Cards for the next anniversary. Sorry, I can't go for the patriotic kitsch. It would be best to just silently remember the dead.