EDITORIAL: "American fiscal policy: No time to waste; The American economy urgently needs a big fiscal stimulus. Too bad both parties are putting politics first," The Economist, 22 November 2008.

The quintessential editorial from the Economist on the need for the big USG stimulus package, and some warning about both the Dems and GOP acting partisan on the subject. Piece starts off by saying that the G-20 states all promised "rapid" fiscal stimulus packages and that they seem to be delivering while America dithers. Stuff may be proposed in the House, it says, but deals seem to by dying in the Senate, with everyone waiting on 20 January for the dynamics to change. The fear expressed here is that delays are too costly:

Americans' collective and sudden rediscovery of thrift is pushing the economy into its worst recession since at least 1982. And unlike the early 1980s, there is little prospect of a quick turnaround.

So the Economist asks for an additional (beyond the bank bailout) stimulus of at least $300B and an extension of unemployment benefits, picking up where states are forced to leave off. Plus, with plenty of state-based infrastructure projects dropping from "shovel-ready" status to postponed indefinitely, now is the time for the Fed to step into the void and start making all that infrastructure repair and upgrade that experts have been so long preaching.