The optimist in me says Obama can pivot off a health-care victory and launch some new initiatives that palpably and quickly spur job growth. The realist says there aren't any such initiatives.

Nobody promised you this would be easy, Harry. But, hell, why are you there, anyway? Your responsibility is to do the right thing by the American people and bring down future health-care costs.

The dirty little secret on each side of the Pacific is that both America and China are capable of producing far more than their own consumers are capable of buying. The root of the problem is in domestic inequality.

Harry Reid's public option is a token public option -- a fleeting gesture toward the idea of a public option, so small and desiccated as to be barely worth mentioning except that it still contains the word "public."