Letters to the Editor
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There is a reason to "clobber me now"
Look, the reason (some) economists feel like taking the lumps now is that in these situations taking your medicine now is generally less painful than in the future. It isn't a question of where we will be in 2 years time, it is a prediction that reflating a bubble, say, as a means of dealing with short-term economic pain in the long run.
There were quite a few voices (especially outside of the US) complaining that Greenspan was inflating a housing bubble to get the US out of the aftereffects of the dot com bubble. And you know what? They didn't know what was going to happen in terms of when, but they were pretty right on as far as the consequences.
A bigger recession back in the early 2000s might have helped to correct some of the imbalances we have--e.g. a huge current account deficit that is financing our lack of savings. Borrowing from other countries to finance asset bubbles is not sustainable--and the longer it continues the worse the readjustment will be.
So the question to me isn't "why not now?" it is more "why not 7 years ago?"