Obama's Invisible Achievement

I found an interesting article over at Truthdig about perhaps the most notable achievement of President Obama's administration...one that perhaps will remain virtually invisible for generations until some historical perspective can be achieved. I agree that had Obama not acted aggressively on the economy, things would now be much, much worse. Here is an excerpt:

The hardest slogan to sell in politics is: “Things could have been a whole lot worse.” No wonder President Barack Obama is having trouble defending his stimulus plan.

If governments around the world, including our own, had not acted aggressively—and had not spent piles of money—a very bad economic situation would have become a cataclysm.

But because the cataclysm was avoided, this is an invisible achievement. Many whose bacon was saved, particularly in the banking and corporate sectors, do not want to admit how important the actions of government were. Anti-government ideologues try to pretend that no serious intervention was required.

So everyone goes back to complaining about high deficits and the shortcomings of government as if nothing had happened. This is now creating problems for Obama on health care.

Obama could never win with the right wingnuts, who would have criticized him for doing too little had he not acted aggressively. Now they just tell lies and call names. Reminds me of grade school bullies.