John Judis at The New Republic saw fit to grace us with this (charmingly titled "The Emerging Republican Majority"):
... what could happen in the Obama administration isn’t successful--whether out of Republican perfidy or administration timidity--at arresting this downturn. Obama and the Democrats could get tossed out of office in 2012. They could even see setbacks in 2010 in spite of mix of seats that are up for re-election. My precedent, as I mentioned at the end of my essay on Keynes, is the British Labour Party. It took office in 1929 after a decade of high unemployment with the depression about to set. Paralyzed and confused, they did nothing; the party split and was routed in 1931. It didn’t return to power until 1945 even though the administrations that succeeded it were not able to do much about the depression either.Can I make something plain? Obama has been in office for slightly more than two weeks. I may not know much about economics, but considering the relative rarity of gigantic worldwide economic collapse, I'm not 100% convinced that anyone can speak with a great deal of authority right now. But I do know that a fortnight is maybe a wee bit short to give an administration to totally fix everything.
Further, can we pause, and take a breath, and admit the possibility that mmmmmmmmmmmmaybe, juuuuuuuuuust maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaybe the stimulus will work? Can we take a look at the very, very recent past and remember that we just got through the longest [insert horribly foul swear words here] presidential campaign ever? Can we give things a bit of time before we start predicting doom and handicapping the 2010 midterm races? Please? Pretty please?
I know that the right wing is salivating about the possibility of failure, which I consider monstrous, as a failure on Obama's part means a failure of our economy. But let's not wring our hands unless it actually happens!
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