Too little, too late

Nearly a year ago, Paul Krugman said that the $800 billion stimulus wouldn't fill the gap in aggregate demand. His colleagues are catching up.

Optimistic assumptions in turn contributed to producing a package that if anything is too small, analysts say. “The economy was weaker than we thought at the time, so maybe in retrospect we could have used a little bit more and little bit more front-loaded,” said Joel Prakken, chairman of Macroeconomic Advisers, another financial analysis group, in St. Louis.

Now, finally, there's an expert consensus that we ought to reup for more. Yeah, experts and another half a trillion dollars would buy us the stimulus we needed in the first place. Unfortunately, the Republicans and the Senate Blue Dog Democrats are immune to experts and would rather have Hoovervilles than fix the problem.

Actually, the Republicans gain as America loses, and they're o.k. with that. The Blue Dog Dems? What do they get? Do they put keeping their own jobs ahead of keeping millions of their constituents employed? Or are they just not very smart? Only if the stimulus succeeds wildly are they likely to retain their seats, yet they dither like a bunch of pullets headed for the plucker.