The Political Calculations of Obama's Budget

Today's SF Chronicle has an excellent political analysis of Obama's eye-popping budget proposal. Money quotes:

"Historically, a president's first year is almost always his most productive. 'If you can't do it in your first term with your first budget, you almost never get a chance to do it later,' said Stan Collender"

and...

"By reaching so high, Obama's fortunes rest on the economy. 'If the economy recovers and there's prosperity in 2011, he'll beat any Republican,' said Boston University historian Bruce Schulman. 'If not, many, many Republicans could beat him.'"

In other news, former Bush speechwriter David Frum (the fellow who coined the "axis of evil" line) has written an article in Newseek titled "Why Rush is Wrong" about Limbaugh's recently-stated hope that the president of the United States "fails".