Walking the President-in-Waiting Walk

With all the demurrals about one president at a time, what Barack Obama said and didn't say today will be closely parsed by markets, publics and political leaders everywhere.

His appearance, flanked by a team of economic advisors, was meant to show a nervous world that he is on the case, ready to move on January 20th and as involved as he can be in the role of President-Elect.

"(A)s we monitor and address these immediate economic challenges," he said, "we will be moving forward in laying out a set of policies that will grow our middle class and strengthen our economy in the long term. We cannot afford to wait on moving forward on the key priorities that I identified during the campaign, including clean energy, health care, education, and tax relief for middle-class families.

"My transition team will be working on each of these priorities in the weeks ahead, and I intend to reconvene this advisory board to discuss the best ideas for responding to these immediate problems."

But Obama made it clear he favors "a stimulus package passed, either before or after inauguration...sooner rather than later,” if not in the lame-duck Congressional session, as soon as he takes office, and he called for an extension of unemployment benefits.

In the minuet between now and then, the President-in-Waiting is deferring to the one in the White House but making it clear he is ready to take new steps on his own. A worried world clearly would like to see the dance speeded up.

The Politics of Unemployment

Congressional Democrats and Republicans are doing an election-year dance with the White House over extending unemployment benefits. The House yesterday failed to approve a proposal to give jobless workers an extra three months of eligibility, but Democrats are bringing the bill back for another vote today.

Yesterday's bill came up after the May jobless report showed the largest one-month flood of filings in 22 years, the rate up to 5.5 percent from 5 percent, as the number of laid-off workers increased to 8.5 million with more than 1.6 million out of work for 27 weeks or more and no longer eligible for benefits.

Some worried Republicans are supporting the extension, including John McCain, but President Bush keeps threatening to veto it as "not fiscally responsible to extend benefits in states with very low unemployment rates."

The logic of this is mind-boggling, since workers in those states would collect a smaller total of benefits for families that need help as much as those in areas with higher unemployment rates.

Democrats are not unaware of this impasse as an election issue. Rahm Emanuel, chair of the Democratic House caucus, observed that Republicans "are all for spending an additional 10 or 12 years in Iraq, but they're opposed to 13 additional weeks of benefits for unemployed people who, through no fault of their own, are without work."

But election-year rhetoric won't feed hungry children. A veto-proof bill should be on the Congressional menu this week without political applesauce.