Party Before Country

We’re getting to know the Obama administration, and what we are seeing is not pretty.

President Obama came into office with two urgent priorities.

One priority was urgently needed by the country: save the banking system.

The other priority was loudly demanded by his party: spend a lot of money on Democratic constituencies.

A tough choice! But of course no choice at all. Obama went with his party.

Result: Congress has just voted to spend almost a trillion dollars on bailouts for (mostly liberal) states and infrastructure projects that will not start until 2010. Meanwhile the bank bailout is a shambles after Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner’s disastrous performance on Capitol Hill this week.

Rumor offers this reason for Geithner’s poor performance: He was politically sandbagged.

He was told at the last minute to go slow on offering details of Treasury plans lest their cost frighten Congress – and weaken support for the stimulus spending plan.

But we don’t need the rumor to see the choice.

A spending plan the country does not need has been voted by Congress. The bank plan the country does need is still on the drawing board.

When the plan finally emerges – and the Obama administration has to ask for another trillion or two trillion or three trillion to finance that plan – Congress may balk. They will say: If only we had known this earlier, we’d never have wasted that trillion on an ineffective stimulus plan!

Well we do know – and the administration certainly knows. And if this recession deepens and broadens, blame Obama for his decision this week to do party payback first, national rescue later.