Reactions?

Update: Look at the camera, Mr. President.

Update: I think he explained the situation very well.

If the stimulus bill in its current form is the bill that becomes law, is this a victory or a defeat for progressivism? Or something in between?

Arguing for “defeat” is Paul Krugman —

What do you call someone who eliminates hundreds of thousands of American jobs, deprives millions of adequate health care and nutrition, undermines schools, but offers a $15,000 bonus to affluent people who flip their houses?

A proud centrist. For that is what the senators who ended up calling the tune on the stimulus bill just accomplished.

Professor Krugman explains why the stuff the mushy moderates cut out of the bill were the most economically stimulating parts, while much of what they left in will provide little stimulus. He is put out with President Obama for compromising away too much in the name of “bipartisanship.”

Republicans also believe they have defeated progressivism, and so they are celebrating. Alec MacGillis and Perry Bacon Jr. write in the Washington Post ,

Rep. Pete Sessions (R-Tex.) suggested last week that the party is learning from the disruptive tactics of the Taliban, and the GOP these days does have the bravado of an insurgent band that has pulled together after a big defeat to carry off a quick, if not particularly damaging, raid on the powers that be. …

…The fact that the stimulus legislation keeps moving forward nonetheless has done nothing to dim Republicans’ satisfaction. Rather, they sense a tactical victory, particularly in the framing of their opposition to the plan as a clash with congressional Democrats instead of with President Obama, who remains far more popular with voters than does Congress.

Republicans are holding congressional Democrats responsible for the wasteful spending they say is in the stimulus package, even though most of the big-ticket items — for renewable energy, health care and schools — are ones that Obama wanted in the package to advance his long-term goals.

President Obama seems to have picked up on this and is moving to take more ownership of the bill. E.J. Dionne writes at WaPo,

By evening, when the president spoke to Democratic House members in Williamsburg, he had cast aside his efforts to placate Republicans who had no intention of reasoning with him on the stimulus bill. Obama had turned the other cheek often enough.

“Don’t come to the table with the same tired arguments and worn ideas that helped to create this crisis,” the born-again campaigner thundered. “We are not going to get relief by turning back to the very same policies that, for the last eight years, doubled the national debt and threw our economy into a tailspin.”

Deploying a preacher’s unapologetically judgmental cadences, Obama denounced “the losing formula that says only tax cuts will work for every problem we face.” He reiterated that argument in his Saturday radio address and will press it in speeches on the road this week.

Gallup reports that Obama is way ahead of congressional Republicans in approval polls.

At The Guardian, Michael Tomasky argues that liberals are worryworts and should be celebrating.

Think back. Two months ago, people were talking nervously about a stimulus package worth about $400bn. Now? Assuming the Senate and House of Representatives more or less split the difference between their two versions of the bill – they will likely iron those out this week and vote on the final passage of the new product by the week’s end – we’re talking twice that, with at least $500bn in new spending (the rest is tax cuts). That is, by some distance, the largest public spending bill ever conceived in the US.

Republicans are in disarray. First, this approach goes against everything they believe. Second, they are suddenly losing an argument that they thought they were winning. To hear cable television tell the story last week, they had Obama on the ropes. Support for the package was allegedly sinking like a stone in the country. Then he goes out and gives a grand total of one speech, not even one of his better ones, and bam, suddenly they’re losing. They must be absolutely irate – and privately very, very nervous about the future.

Futher, he says, this bill isn’t the only program in the works to stimulate the economy.

Treasury secretary Tim Geithner is rolling out a plan today to get credit flowing and protect homeowners. Soon, the administration will present a proper budget, in which it can signal priorities about things like transport and the greening of the economy, which are multi-year projects in the best of circumstances.

There’s also the view that a flawed stimulus is better than no stimulus.