Generally, I thought that the speech hit just the right notes. Many of these ideas are laid down in the books The Political Mind and The Political Brain, both are worth the time.
As the President executed his political tap dance, he articulated commonsensical policy prescriptions for the problems we face as a nation. Not an easy feat. Health care, Energy Independence, Education, Curing Cancer, and Financial Regulatory Reform; he truly had policy prescriptions that both citizens and policy wonks alike can identify with.
That said, as a nation all short, medium, and long-term challenges and goals are trivial if the financial system it not fixed. On this agenda item I think that the President's words and the Administrations rhetoric have been opaque, weak, and reactive. And the speech had nothing new to offer in that regard.
Honestly, if I had to write a playbook about the first 100 Days of a Presidency it would be pretty close to what the Obama team has done, but this competence to this point has been overshadowed by the incompetence on the banking system front. I hope this is soon to change.
Again, I won't really be around the next week or so, so please read all of these folks to get an idea of what financial system reform is looking like and what it should look like.
News Reports
Stress Test
Housing Sales
Bank Capital
Citigroup - Zombie or Government Entity?
Government - Which Has Not Looked Good
Joint Statement
State of the Nation Address
Bernanke Testimony
Blogosphere - Where The Debate Has Been Smart and Lively
Calculated Risk (read everything yesterday and today)
Krugman (read it all)
Yves Smith (is on top of the debate)
WSJ Real-Time Economics (they talk to more reputable economists than anyone)
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