The Public Is Not Rational But Desires MIracles

This was a particularly insightful comment/response to an article by William Galston in the New Republic that showed the public's negative reaction to most of this Administration's policies and proposals over the last 18 months:

I think what the public really wanted was to get their old jobs and home values back, or to have other miraculous events occur. But I also think it is dangerous to believe what anyone says the public really "thinks" or "regards", because the public certainly responds but is generally not rational. "The public" responds more at an emotional level. And the terms of the financial bailout were set under the Bush Administration -- Democrats' role in setting the terms was to change the "bailout" from being a complete blank check. Certainly the Democrats could have pushed for punitive measures against those responsible, but that may have required passing laws that applied retroactively, which wouldn't really fly. All they really could have done was to fire more of the people at any firms that took government money.

I certainly agree with Galston's conclusion, but while we can point to things that might have been done better, anything that didn't fundamentally alter the trajectory of the economy would just be tinkering around the edges. The bottom line is that the economy is in terrible shape, and that's far more important than the other aspects. And I do not think there was really a lot more the Democrats could have done, because our economic problems are too deeply rooted to solve in a year or two.