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Barack the Builder (see sig)
Slate: By David Sessions, Sunday, Nov. 23, 2008, at 4:23 AM ET
The New York Times, Washington Post, and Los Angeles Times all lead with President-elect Barack Obama's announcement Saturday of a sweeping stimulus plan designed to create 2.5 million jobs by spending billions on infrastructure, education, and alternative energy. The plan is more expansive than anything Obama proposed during his campaign and eclipses the last stimulus proposal attempted by President Clinton in 1996.
The LAT sees Obama's two-year job proposal as "the latest indication that the president-elect has decided to use the transition period to influence events at a time of crisis, when the current administration appears powerless to stop a slide." All three papers highlight the fact that Obama's new plan is more aggressive and expensive than the one he proposed during the campaign, though the WP notes that Obama's address was vague on specifics and price tags. (The Post also projects that the package will cost "well over" $200 billion, which would be "bold" compared to previous presidents' similar plans.) The NYT and WP both consider the possibility that Republicans could block such an ambitious deficit-spending measure.
http://www.slate.com/id/2205301/
