I Hope You Enjoyed Your Honeymoon Mr. President - Now Get to Work

New Presidents are usually allowed an adjustment time to get used to the job before the public expects much of them. Indeed, Presidents rarely get blamed (or credited) with a lot of what happens for their first year in office as people attribute the results in that period to the acts of the prior Administration. Well, don't expect Obama to have this freedom. Obama at best is going to have a "quickie" for this honeymoon.

Nonetheless, I think there is some acceptance building for the notion that we are in this economic mess for at least a couple more years, despite what Obama does, so perhaps people will not expect instant results. Personally, I am just hoping to avert total economic melt-down, so if we can tread water on the economy for now I am one happy soul.

Whether it works or not, I was encouraged a bit about some of what I heard today on the eternally shifting Obama plan for our economy. This too can change, but here are some promising things I heard on the Bloomberg channel as I worked out at lunch:

• there will be less emphasis on tax refunds. This is good as you cannot control how people spend their money, assuming they even spend it;
• money will be increased to unemployment and Medicade. We need to help those in need, so this is a necessity. At least the unemployed tend to spend what they receive, so it has a bit of a stimulus effect, and they spend it on necessities (we hope);
• more focus will be on a trickle-up effect and less on supporting the financial institutions that were key players in creating this mess;
• infrastructure spending, which we need anyway, is a key part of it, which will create jobs and, at a minimum, achieve some long term benefit;
• support for ailing state budgets. States, especially California, are in dire straights. This is the worst time to be cutting necessary benefits and services. Sure, cut back on the extraneous, but not on areas that are even more pressing in today's times. We need police, firefighters, teachers, student aid and the like. Cutting these, even in the short term, is a mistake; and
• alternative fuel investment continues to be a no brainer.

Overall, a more promising tone on where things are going than what I read last week, but with the ever-changing world of politics, it could get worse again. Obama may need to trade some of the good for some of the bad to get anything passed in short order. We will see.

By the way, I have suggested that the U.S. may run into problems with people - as in other countries - supporting the cost of our bailout. Well, I am thinking that the world overall right now is in so much hurt that the U.S. is starting to look pretty good in comparison. Not that we should be foolish in building debt or taking on more than necessary, but - crossing my fingers and toes - I think we may get the support we need, but not if we need a trillion or more per year for years to come.

Putin' His Budget Where His Oil Is?

Vladimir Putin has ordered that Russia redo its budget based on oil at $41 a barrel, not the previous budget expectation of $95 a barrel. I have mentioned before that low gas/oil prices are good for us and bad for others. And while we may love to stick it to the likes of the Middle East, Russia and Venezuela, there is a limit to how far this can go before these countries search for ways to stick it back. We do not want to build political or social instability. Then again, when it comes to oil prices, it is at least in part that supply/demand thingy, which is beyond control.

Any hoot, oil down to $35 a barrel today. Perhaps Putin needs to do a new budget again. Expect gas in the U.S. down to close to a dollar a gallon before this mess is over. Frankly, I would prefer a higher support as it is hard for alternative energy companies to stay alive at these prices.

Disclosure: I have a couple of hundred bucks (it used to be more) in an algae company.