'Nobody Knows The Outcome, So The Most Important Thing Is Speed'

Who cares if we're like Bill Murray in Groundhog Day, careening in his pickup toward the brink of the rock quarry?  At least we're moving fast!

That seemed to be Claire Shipman's logic in urging speed in the implementation of the stimulus plan. The ABC correspondent made her curious comment today during the roundtable segment of This Week.

CLAIRE SHIPMAN: Don't you think that, I mean as George [Will] said, given that nobody knows the outcome, it seems as though the most important thing is speed here.

Will made the logical response.

GEORGE WILL: What if you're going in the wrong direction?

SHIPMAN: But, how are you going to know?

ROBERT REICH: As FDR said, you've got to do something. You try it. If it doesn't work, you try something else.

WILL: Yes, and we got to 1939 or 1940, and his Treasury Secretary Morgenthau said we've had this record spending and it hasn't worked.

George Stephanopoulos tried to defend his phone buddy Rahm Emanuel's plan.

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: Even the critics of the first bail-out say that the alternative very well could have been worse because we could have had an absolute collapse of the market.

Note to Prof. Reich: once you've blown a trillion or so, your ability to "try something else" is kind of limited.

Note: Some readers may have noticed that I'm not posting as frequently here as in the past.  I recently launched FinkelBlog, but while I'm posting most of my work there, am delighted to say that I remain a NewsBusters contributor.