IMF: US should pass debt ceiling and delay spending cuts/tax increases

This is something that those of us who took Econ 101 already knew. You don't depress demand in a sickly economy. I still think the President erred by embracing the GOP's deficit talk only a year after the initial stimulus. He should have defended the stimulus much more strongly and regularly, explained that the deficit will have to wait until Americans are working again - and that any Econ 101 student knows this. Now we, and he, are trapped in a negotiation that seems destined to end in either bad or worse.

If the President is truly putting the country first, and saying to hell with politics, and that's the reason he's embracing the deficit talk and talks, then he should have never embraced the GOP meme on the deficit in the first place - or, at the very least he should have proposed spending cuts and tax increases that don't kick in for several years until the economy is back on its feet.

And politically speaking, it's hard to imagine how any deficit deal's impact on the electorate will offset the depressing effect such a deal will have on the economy.  And unlike policy wonks living in the only city in America where the economy seems to be truly recovering, people vote their jobs first.  And I suspect the GOP is counting on that.