Anniversary

This week Obama has been trying to tout the success of his stimulus program. As I said last year, the package passed by Congress was too small to have a noticeable effect on the economy. There are very few times when additional fiscal spending can prove effective and now that interest rates are less accommodating, the Democrats suddenly realize that they need to create jobs. To create jobs this year, they need to budget the money last year. So expect to see a lot of expensive and useless election year gimmicks being proposed and some fraction of them being passed into law.

Overall, Obama has been ineffective in his first year in office, but he has exceeded my incredibly low expectations. Hopefully, he is learning the lesson that he can't just let Congress create legislation by itself. This is a President who wants to be liked by everyone, but if he wants the job to get done, he's going to have to step on a few toes. I suspect he will be very polite as he does so.