Via Yglesias: OH NO! Look out America! Look at what the Washington Post has on today's page A6!
But congressional negotiators have since trimmed billions of dollars from the package to satisfy Senate Republicans, diminishing its potential for job creation along with its overall cost. With the House poised to vote as early as today on the measure, analysts are slashing their estimates of its ability to counteract a deepening recession, with several prominent economists now saying the package will save or create fewer than 2.5 million jobs by the end of next year.
In other words, if someone doesn't do something - fast! - then centrists may undercut the stimulus package LAST WEEK WHEN THEY DID ALL OF THIS IN THE FIRST PLACE.
Or, as Jonathan Chait more politely avers: "What frustrates me is that the Post didn't write this when it could have made a difference."
Indeed: 'tis frustrating! Look, need I remind you of the Ben Nelson variations? This guy was on television, with Norah O'Donnell, who asked him to respond to Paul Krugman's accusation that the cuts he and his cohorts were making to the bill were not done "based on any coherent economic argument, but simply to demonstrate their centrist mojo." Nelson responded with, GUESS WHAT? An incoherent economic argument!
Right about then, you have to wonder why every reporter covering this story didn't have the same thought: "Wait! This is the guy who's overseeing the passage of this bill? He does not seem to make a lick of sense!" At the very least, when Nelson went on the "Rachel Maddow Show" later that day and demonstrated that he didn't even know what school construction is, someone should have started to sound some serious alarms.
Anyway, as painful as it is to sit and wonder if the press is even capable of distinguishing their ass from a hole in the ground, it's worse still to hear them clamoring "LOOK OUT! That's not my ass!" after you've already fallen in the hole.