Fortune.com: Inside Obama's Economic Crusade

[scheming daemons]

A fascinating look behind the scenes of Obama's economic team at work.

This article was surprisingly balanced, considering the source.

It gives me greater confidence in Obama's team than I had before I read it.

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The team is fast at work on health-care reform, energy independence, vast changes in banking regulations, and the possibility of a "grand bargain" to curb entitlement costs that envisions historic sacrifices on both sides of the aisle: Republicans supporting tax increases and Democrats conceding to benefits cuts. "This is not a small-ball President," says Summers, Obama's top economic advisor and chair of the National Economic Council. "He wants to take on the large issues."

There is a breadth and breathlessness to these under-takings, a frenzy of policymaking that will shape the contours of America's economic future. Top Obama advisors who talked (often as they walked) with Fortune in early February put a premium on speed - speed to catch the right moment to turn around a deepening recession, speed to take advantage of this moment of crisis to put in place a Democratic vision of government's role, speed to pass major legislation while the President is riding high in the polls. Obama's White House has been endlessly compared to Lincoln's team of rivals, or J.F.K.'s best and brightest. But we might also toss in the image of Sandra Bullock trying to control a runaway busload of passengers before the bomb goes off. (That scene was of course from the movie - "Speed.")

If that means rolling over a growing chorus of critics and forsaking a more measured and thoughtful lawmaking process, Obama officials insist they have no choice. Romer's own academic research concludes that no post-World War II recession (nor the Great Depression) was solved by fiscal policy. While opponents say this proves that the spending-laden package that barreled through Congress is a nearly $800 billion experiment to overcome that history, Romer insists it's all about timing. The main reason fiscal policy didn't work in the past, she says, was government hesitation. "Normally that process didn't happen until the recession was practically over," says the former Berkeley economist. "What's so exciting and amazing is precisely that we're getting our act together in time to do some good."

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http://money.cnn.com/2009/02/13/news/economy/easton_economicteam.fortune/index.htm?postversion=2009021310