Tim Cavanaugh on The New New Deal's Lame Defense of Obama and the Stimulus

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The grand subject of Michael Grunwald's book The New New Deal is Barack Obama's American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Unfortunately, writes Tim Cavanaugh, Grunwald goes on for nearly half a thousand frequently repetitive pages of text, all explicating a convoluted set of theories. While the impulse to go beyond soundbites and catchphrases is admirable in some circumstances, the book's essential premise—that the stimulus will be viewed as a success in the long term—is too simple and the arguments in support of that premise are too rambling. In the end, Cavanaugh reports, Grunwald's defense of the stimulus is a failure.