Obama Could Try Some of His Vaunted Fiscal Responsibility

Administration involved in major economic gambles
By Gabriel Winant,  Newser Staff
Posted Apr 21, 2009 11:10 AM CDT
Obama Could Try Some of His Vaunted Fiscal Responsibility
President Barack Obama gestures while delivering remarks on the economy on April 14, 2009, at Georgetown University in Washington.   (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)

In a recent speech at Georgetown, President Obama outlined his plans for the economy. The funny thing is, David Brooks writes in the New York Times, "he sounded like a cultural conservative." The president talked about the good old days and vowed to end fiscal irresponsibility. In short, Obama cast his agenda as "a defense of middle-class morality," Brooks writes. And there's just one problem with that.

Obama himself is taking major risks—spending wildly and trying to stay a step ahead of the market. “Federal spending is the leverage the administration uses to gain control over sector after sector, and yet this money is all borrowed," Brooks writes. The president understands that we're in an "authority crisis" as well as an economic one, but "he will seem like an impostor if he imposes responsibility on everybody but himself." (More Barack Obama stories.)

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