Quotes From Around Yon Blogosphere

The country moved into its second year of uninterrupted job losses last month, with companies shedding another 598,000 jobs and the unemployment rate moving up to 7.6 percent, the Labor Department reported on Friday.

Economists had forecast a loss of 540,000 jobs and a unemployment rate of 7.5 percent.

Job losses were once again spread across both manufacturing and service industries, reinforcing the picture of an economy that is contracting at its fastest pace in decades.

-- EDMUND L. ANDREWS

The biggest danger for Obama will come if Republican attacks erode support for the stimulus among Democrats. That's why the president will be spending more time with congressional Democrats in the coming days. The administration's visionary emphasis on winning expansive Republican support has been replaced by a down-to-earth struggle to get a bill through the Senate.

Its hopes rest in part on a different form of bipartisanship. If Washington Republicans have decided to build a wall of opposition to the stimulus, Republican governors and mayors are eager for the money Obama wants to give them.

-- E.J. DIONNE

Watching the GOP attack the stimulus bill as "spending, not stimulus," it's a pretty safe bet that they're going to unite en masse against new spending after the stimulus is added into the deficit number. Expect to hear the GOP say "trillion" with the frequency they used to say "9/11."

This will have serious implications for health care. There's little doubt that health reform can save money in the long-term. But it also is likely to require up-front spending. For instance: Evidence showing that angioplasties really are overused could save billions of dollars. But to get that evidence, you're going to have to spend hundreds of millions running cardiovascular trials and gathering comparative treatment data. To invert the old cliche, you have to spend money to save money.

-- EZRA KLEIN

It's not that surprising that Republicans don't like the stimulus package that David Obey wrote and filled with goodies for liberals. What's less clear is why liberals seem to be attached to everything in Obey's fantasy. Just because it is a good idea doesn't mean it is the end of the world if it isn't in the stimulus. The stimulus bill has a specific job and that job isn't to fulfill every item on liberals' wish list.

-- BOOMAN

Nor is the No. 1 problem that the president can't seem to win a single Republican vote for his stimulus package. That's a symptom, not a cause. The reason Obama is getting so few votes is that he is no longer setting the terms of the debate over how to save the economy. Instead the Republican Party -- the one we thought lost the election -- is doing that. And the confusion and delay this is causing could realize Obama’s worst fears, turning "crisis into a catastrophe," as the president said.

-- MICHAEL HIRSH

[N]ervous retirees are making most of the decisions, rather than young families. The trouble is that America is getting grayer. People with young children are spenders rather than savers. Young people take risks, and old people buy insurance. Your country needs more children. Demographic dearth is the root cause of the economic crisis. Too many aging people tried to accumulate too many assets, and created the biggest asset bubble of all time.

-- SPENGLER

Can I just say that Obama’s plan to limit executive pay to 500k is freaking idiotic. Who in their right mind will take on a job in this sector for such little pay. The top hedge fund manager just made $1 billion last year. Why would the head of a major bank make 500k?

-- MOSES

I'm sensing a bit of Democratic anxiety -- maybe even panic -- about the stimulus bill. And while I'm not exactly thrilled with how things are going, I think everyone needs to step back, chill, and look at the bigger picture.

The stimulus bill remains one of the most aggressively progressive efforts in some time. Yes, things could be better. But there are lots of great spending priorities in there -- and even the tax cuts are directed in a much more progressive direction. So even assuming people like Collins and Nelson cut $200 billion out (and they won’t get close), it's still a fairly big and very progressive bill.

-- PUBLIUS

What’s not to like about the stimulus bill? That it’s messy? My desk is messy. Everything Congress ever touches is messy.

-- GAIL COLLINS

[I]f the president continues to stumble over the next few weeks, then he can expect the tenor of the criticism directed against him to change. America doesn't have time to break in a new president. Fairly, or unfairly, Obama will not have the luxury of a long, leisurely shake down cruise for his Administration. He has already lost a significant amount of goodwill with his faux pas. Given the enormous challenges we face, it would behoove the new Administration to get its act together sooner rather than later.

-- RICK MORAN