The president-elect sets his priorities

What happened

President-elect Barack Obama began laying the foundation of his administration this week, as he filled several key positions and formed an initial strategy for dealing with the deeply troubled economy. Faced with a potentially severe and prolonged recession, Obama was reported to be considering a stimulus package of as much as $500 billion. The funds would likely be spent on projects to repair roads and bridges, as well as on extensions of unemployment benefits, alternative energy investment, and aid to state and local governments.

Obama had his first visit to the Oval Office this week as he met with President Bush to discuss the transition of power. Obama is said to have pressed for aid to struggling U.S. automakers, which Bush has opposed. The president-elect named Rahm Emanuel, a brash congressman and Democratic strategist, as his chief of staff, and John Podesta, a veteran of the Clinton administration, as head of his transition team. The two men said Obama would reverse a number of Bush’s policies immediately upon taking office. Obama plans to lift bans on federal funding for stem-cell research and overseas family-planning organizations that discuss abortions, allow California to set its own emissions limits on cars, and restore bans on drilling in and around federal parkland. Obama’s priorities, his aides said, will also include the middle-class tax cut he promised during the campaign.

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What the editorials said

The nation’s economic woes are severe, but “there is no dearth of international concerns that could preoccupy Mr. Obama,” said the Baltimore Sun. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict may be off the front pages, but in the Middle East it remains a prime source of conflict and instability. Meanwhile, Obama’s commitment to withdraw from Iraq will be tricky to fulfill under the best of circumstances. Even in the midst of an economic crisis, the president-elect can’t afford to drop the ball on pressing foreign issues.

The new president will “start strong” if he can “change the bitter tenor in Washington,” said The Dallas Morning News. To do that, Obama will have to overcome the partisan instincts of a Democratic Congress and build bridges to the Republicans. With Iraq, Afghanistan, and a recession on his plate, Obama should “pick his battles carefully,” and not make Bill Clinton’s mistake of trying to do too much, too fast.

What the columnists said

Progressives hope the new administration institutes far-reaching changes, said Paul Krugman in The New York Times, “especially a universal health-care system.” But with everyone looking for Obama to imitate Franklin Delano Roosevelt, it’s worth noting that FDR’s short-term economic fixes were too modest to end the Great Depression; only “the enormous public works project known as World War II” provided sufficient stimulus. To jump-start this economy, Obama should decide how much stimulus it needs, “then add 50 percent.”

If Obama wants a role model for his presidency, said Jonathan Cohn in The New Republic Online, he might consider George W. Bush. Bush may be deemed a failure, but he’s accomplished many of the goals conservatives had sought for decades—cutting taxes, signing landmark education reform, and packing the Supreme Court and other federal courts with conservatives. And that’s just on the domestic front. Obama, too, has an “ambitious agenda,’’ albeit one “pushing in the opposite ideological direction.” After his historic victory, he’s got the political capital to seek major change.

Capital notwithstanding, there’s only so much Obama can do, said Steven Pearlstein in The Washington Post. He’ll soon have to acknowledge that the government “cannot rescue every important industry, save or replace every job, prevent every foreclosure, and restore every budget cut.” The sooner he “levels” with us about that, the sooner he’ll “establish confidence in his leadership and restore faith in our economic future.”

What next?

Polls show voters have high hopes that Obama will improve everything from the economy to race relations. Seventy percent of voters said they expect a better economy under Obama, while more than two-thirds of respondents said they are “optimistic” about Obama’s presidency. With more than a million jobs lost this year and a gloomy Christmas awaiting retailers, Obama’s first task may be to lower expectations that “change” will be easy—or swift.