Obama Stimulates For The Third Time

ST. PETERSBURG, FL -- Barack Obama's campaign wants to talk about the economy a lot and about race not at all.  To that end he received a gift today in the form of a large block banner headline in the St. Petersburg Times: "Florida Is In Recession"  First the first time in 16 years, this boom state is officially a bust. The Florida press corps will write about the economy, there is no doubt. Here at Gibbs High School, Obama is announcing what the campaign calls an "emergency stimulus package" in light of today's jump in the unemployment rate.  It's third stim pack that Obama has proposed... actually it's more like version 2.5, because he's essentially reconfigured an earlier version, parts of which have already been signed into law.

Obama would impose a surtax on oil profits to pay for $50 billion in new spending; half would go to state governments to help them shore up budget deficits. Another chunk would go into the depleted highway trust fund. And, in what Obama's economic adviser calls a "downpayment" on middle class tax cut, he'd send checks of $1000 to families and $500 to individuals.

Here's the way the campaign wants this to play out politically:

(1) On the economy, Obama is a man of action. Let McCain blather on about tax cuts. Obama will provide voters with will relief.  (There's an implied comparison here to Democratic campaigns of years past who haven't been flexible enough to account for changes in real-world conditions.)

(2)  Make sure the economic debate isn't just about gas prices, but make sure that voters associate Obama's economic stimulus package with gas price relief. Obama's call for a windfall profits tax earned him his biggest applause. The more the talk is about oil companies, the less difficulty Obama will have with his opposition to domestic oil drilling, which is fairly popular.

(3)  Portray McCain as risky on the economy. (". My opponent believes we're on the right course. He's said our economy has made great progress these past eight years. He's embraced the Bush economic policies and promises to continue them. Well, our country  and families in Florida cannot afford to keep doing the same thing over and over again and expect a different result. That's a gamble we just can't take.")

(4) Reassure liberals. Joining Jason Furman on a conference call this morning was Jared Bernstein of the labor-backed economic policy institute, long an informal adviser to Obama in but today thrust into the spotlight.