But in the U.S., a different news advisory was released to media firms and to the public — one with a more generic headline and with the reference to humiliating authorities deleted.

According to Department of Justice records, the firm behind this PR turn-about is Qorvis Communications, a United States public relations firm that provides “press and public relations services” for Bahrain and which has worked with the country since 2002. The firm also has a contract to provide similar services for the Yemeni government’s “National Awareness Authority,” a state communications arm founded by Tariq Mohammed Abdullah Saleh, nephew of the vacated President Ali Abdullah Saleh, whose regime has been repeatedly condemned for human rights abuses. In the last year, the countries paid more than $500,000 to Qorvis.

An investigation by The American Independent with research assistance provided by the Project on Government Oversight found that the state of Virginia also currently employs Qorvis’s PR services. All told, the state has had slightly more than $70 million in dealings with the company.

Virginia’s contract dates to 2007 (link), when the state awarded the firm an approximately $2 million per year contract to provide “marketing, advertising and communications” services, in addition to $18 million per year in media and production costs handled by the company. The firm’s contract was renewed in 2010, with an agreement to provide only “communications” services, and at the cost of $300,000 per year. Qorvis’s contract will be up for second renewal in April, 2012.

Since the firm’s work began, Virginia has since had record-breaking lottery sales, netting $1.4 billion during the last fiscal year — $444.2 million of which the state put towards education. Jeff Caldwell, press secretary for Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell, who appointed the head of the lottery, declined to comment on the relationship, saying “this contract predates this administration.”

"Beating marks on the back of Nabeel Rajab after police attacked a peaceful protest on July, 15 005" Img via Bahrain Center for Human Rights

A portfolio of the work Qorvis provided to the state can found on Qorvis’s website. Jill Vaughn, director of communications for the lottery, said the firm “help[s] us day to day. If we have a crisis they are very helpful, and we have a lot of special projects throughout the year.” In the last year, the firm has worked on marketing events and promotions — especially for new products. Qorvis did not respond to requests for comment for this article.

Both Bahrain and Yemen have come under scrutiny of late for perceived human rights abuses. Yemen, in particular, has been censured by the United Nations for the killing of a journalist and for stifling free speech. The government of Bahrain, long seen as a U.S. ally in the region, has of late been harshly criticized. Freedom House, a human rights watchdog, issued a policy brief today titled “Killing the Messenger: Bahrain’s Brutal Crackdown,” detailing state violence and torture and calling for the U.S. to apply pressure to the country.

According to the New York Times, rights groups estimate that since protests began, “at least 34 people have been killed, more than 1,400 have been arrested and as many as 3,600 have been dismissed from jobs” in Bahrain. Earlier this fall, Doctors Without Borders and other medical groups were pitched in a fight with the country over the torture and imprisonment of doctors who had treated ailing protesters. And according to Reuters, the leader of a fact-finding mission setup by the country to investigate allegations of human rights violations now believes “torture had been a systematic, though limited, policy.”

Amateur video shot earlier this year and posted on LiveLeak appears to show protesters killed in drive-by shootings conducted by the police.

“Bahrain is taking a turn for the worse on human rights,” said Joe Stork, deputy Middle East director at Human Rights Watch, in a release this April.  The Obama administration suspended and is reviewing its arms sales policy to the country after a number of U.S. senators, including Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), Richard Durbin (D-Ill.) and Senate Foreign Relations Middle East and North Africa Subcommittee chairman Robert Casey (D-Pa.) called for a cessation. Bahrain’s internal fact-finding commission, and subsequent review of alleged torture, is being closely watched by the U.S. as it determines whether to renew its arms agreement.

Virginians alerted to the dealings often expressed exasperation at the state’s use of resources. In some cases, though, the reactions were more personal.

Robert Marrow, board of trustees and chair of the government relations committee at the Adams Center, a northern Virginia mosque and one of the largest Muslim community centers in the United States, said that some of his community members fled from the regimes whose “image” Qorvis’s services are meant to enhance.

“They would oppose that if they had a say,” he said. “Their preference would be against who have made money with blood money on their hands. And if they’re going to be providing a public service they should be people who should have a somewhat higher moral standard.”

Rev. Eddy Aliff, executive director for the Virginia Assembly of Independent Baptists, said that Baptists would likely share that concern, and that he believes the state should “be putting money in the proper places to individuals who truly need that help, and I think that is how most of us who are Baptists would view it.”

Some saw it simply as a business dealing gone awry. “Virginians on a whole are slightly right of center. which means they’re more fiscally conservative than not,” explained Quentin Kidd, chair of the Department of Government at Christopher Newport University.

For Imad Damaj, president of the Virginia Muslim Coalition for Public Affairs, the business fundamentals don’t add up.  “My suggestion is to the state of Virginia is to look into this company and see if you can do business with another one that is not doing these things,” he said. “It is morally right and from a business perspective it is right.”

The Project on Government Oversight, a watchdog group that looks into the effective use of taxpayer resources and which provided The American Independent with records of Qorvis’s PR work for Bahrain, urged transparency on the issue. Ben Freeman, a national security fellow, said, “Virginia residents, whose money is used to pay Qorvis, have a right to know that the company also works to control the media spin for governments that many believe to be guilty of human rights violations.”

Qorvis has repeatedly come under the spotlight for its employment by autocratic regimes, beginning in 2002 when the company was hired by Saudi Arabia in the wake of 9/11 for the purposes of improving the country’s image after it was revealed the majority of hijackers had been of Saudi origin. While a number of firms perform this type of work, often the transactions go more smoothly. Three of the firm’s partners soon left Qorvis out of discomfort with the relationship. Shortly after, the FBI searched the company’s offices.

That scenario repeated itself this spring when more than a third of the firm’s partners left amidst concern about Qorvis work for Middle East regimes with troubled human rights records. “I just have trouble working with despotic dictators killing their own people,” a former Qorvis insider told The Huffington Post.

According to that same insider, Qorvis’s Geo-Political Solutions (GPS) division has a ‘”black arts” program responsible for creating fake blogs and websites that link back to positive content, “to make sure that no one online comes across the bad stuff.”

Last month The New York Times, commenting on the work of foreign relation firms such as Qorvis in Bahrain, reported about a surge in Bahraini trolls — social media users who “cajole, harass and intimidate commentators and journalists who write about the protests in Bahrain and the government’s response.” Guardian writer Brian Whitaker, who has extensively analyzed the firm’s PR techniques, including in some of the documents referenced in the beginning of this article, blogged how Qorvis attempts to present Bahrain as a tolerant country.

The firm’s founder and CEO, Michael Petruzzello, told the Huffington Post that complaints about clientele are “ridiculous” and disingenuous, asserting that the firm’s work with international clients preceded the tenure of departing partners. And the firm’s clients also include household names such as the Dance Institute of Washington, The Washington Post, Intel and the Rosslyn Business Improvement District, according to the firm’s website.

Department of Justice files confirm that news releases issued on behalf of the “Bahrain Ministry of Interior” are issued by Qorvis. Those newswires often reach a wider U.S. audience, such as this release posted by the Sacremento Bee.

Other examples of the firm’s work include a press release dated June 24 that describes the sentencing of 21 individuals convicted of plotting to violently topple Bahrain’s government and of the country’s commitment to fair judicial process. CNN covered the same event noting that Britain’s foreign office minister for the Middle East, Alistair Burt, was “extremely concerned” over the sentencing and the nature of many of the charges. “It is deeply worrying that civilians are being tried before tribunals chaired by a military judge, with reports of abuse in detention, lack of access to legal counsel and coerced confessions,” he said.

This July, Bahrain had its “National Dialogue,” a program by the state that attempts to achieve national unity on issues of politics and religion. Days before this year’s “Dialogue,” U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Michael Posner visited Bahrain to encourage the government to speak with dissenters. But the Shia-oriented al-Wefaq, the largest political opposition group in Bahrain and one of the most fervent protest voices in the country, and the General Federation of Bahrain Trade Unions, withdrew, claiming their concerns, including the rehiring of fired workers, had been ignored in the talks.

At that time, Qorvis issued a glowing press release on behalf of the Kingdom of Bahrain saying, “All the participants are actively debating the issues.” On the same day, Reuters published an article quoting a more inclusive choice of voices: “To reach a complete solution to the big problems, you have five minutes to speak? What is that?” asked Sayed al-Mousawi of the main Shi’ite opposition group Wefaq, quoted in the article. “Is this dialogue?” Two days later, Qorvis issued another press release, praising a “second successful day.”

On the ground in Bahrain, however, the results of the talks have been less than successful. Last week, according to the New York Times, Ali Hassan al-Daihi, the 70-year-old father of an al-Wefaq leader, died after being beaten by police officers the night before. In an extensively blogged post, The Times explained how mourners to his death were forbidden from returning to a symbolic square. It also showed video of police vehicles charging protesters and of a Bahrani police’s statement about its using its vehicles that way: “These allegations don’t have an iota of truth, being baseless,” the official said.

“As the results of Clearspending show, the U.S. continues to lack genuine accountability for government spending,” said Ellen Miller, co-founder and executive director of the Sunlight Foundation. “Spending accountability, data accuracy and independent review will help correct the vast misreporting.”

An Obama administration executive order in response to their earlier findings called for a board to enforce strong federal spending transparency, and the Digital Accountability and Transparency Act (DATA Act) was introduced in the U.S. House this summer to establish a similar independent tracking body. Neither plan has come to fruition yet.

“Although we’ve seen improvements in the past year, the truth is we cannot fully account for how the federal government spends about $1.3 trillion,” Miller continued. “That’s no negligible amount, especially when you compare it to the ‘Super Committee’s’ task of finding $1.5 trillion in deficit cuts.”

The data inaccuracies that caused the $1.3 trillion in misreported funds account for 94.5 percent of all the grant spending data reported in the fiscal year 2008 through 2010, showing only a one percent decrease from misreported funds in 2008.

“I was very pleased with this debate and very excited about the validation of the tea party movement,” Palin told Fox’s Greta VanSusten.

“The winner in this really, I believe, was the tea party movement and that validation of what it is that we’ve been talking about for two years now.”

Palin had high praise for former U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich, noting that he was the only one to discuss going after government fraud, waste and “crony capitalism.”

“Hopefully what he talked about could help teach his colleagues up their on the stage,” she added, speculating that some of the 2012 candidates “don’t have a real strong record to stand on” when it comes to such discussions.

But “any of them” with their “pro-private sector” beliefs, she said, would be better than the failed policies of the Obama administration.

When it comes to her own potential presidential aspirations, however, Palin continues to be coy.

“I’m not going to let the media tell me or dictate when a drop-dead date should be,” Palin said.

“I still have that same old dopey, same old answer that I’m sure you guys are getting sick of hearing, and that is I’m still thinking about it, praying about it, contemplating, talking to my family. I’m sick of giving the same answer, believe me. I’m anxious to give an answer and get on with life one way or the other. But whichever direction life takes me, I’m going to continue to speak up for we the people and that tea Party movement and the mama grizzlies.”

Her present role, she said, is to keep raising issues that candidates should be talking about while on the stump because she believes those in the campaign are following her lead.

Watch the embedded clip below:

Their desire to prove themselves capable of passing legislation is seen most clearly in the leadership of Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), who’s been busy recruiting a slate of House candidates with a wealth of political experience — even if he’s sometimes loath to admit it:

In touting the Republican candidates, he talks frequently about Stephen Fincher, a cotton farmer and gospel singer from Frog Jump, Tenn., who has never run for office before. But equally important is Rick Berg, who served in the North Dakota legislature for more than 25 years and may knock off longtime Rep. Earl Pomeroy. [...]

That kind of resumé is making some Republican backers anxious. At a dinner for Mr. Bruun at Portland’s University Club, a small group of donors sought assurances the new crop would be different from recent Republican majorities, especially on matters of spending.

“The freshman class is going to be bolder than anyone there,” Mr. McCarthy promised to about 15 financial-services executives who had paid $500 for their steak dinner. “They’re going to be like a stampede of horses.”

But the Journal and some House GOP leaders’ predictions about moderation may include a measure of wishful thinking. Many Republican Tea Party candidates are running on a platform that rails against both parties in power for failing to look seriously at issues like government spending, and they possess a sincere desire to repeal the Democrats’ health care bill — so it seems unlikely that they’ll assume the role of cynical Washington insiders quite so quickly.

Besides, McCarthy’s own rhetoric to donors indicates that the GOP’s public stance is that the freshman class is going to be bold — a message some candidates might just mistakenly take to heart.

Fourteen million unemployed represents a gigantic waste of human capital, an irrecoverable loss of wealth and spending power, and an affront to the ideals of America. Some 6.8 million have been out of work for 27 weeks or more. Congressmen went home to celebrate July 4 having failed to extend unemployment benefits.

We recognize the necessity of a program to cut the mid- and long-term federal deficit but the imperative requirement now, and the surest course to balance the budget over time, is to restore a full measure of economic activity. As in the 1930s, the economy is suffering a sharp decline in aggregate demand and loss of business confidence. Long experience shows that monetary policy may not be enough, particularly in deep slumps, as Keynes noted.

The urgent need is for government to replace the lost purchasing power of the unemployed and their families and to employ other tax-cut and spending programs to boost demand. Making deficit reduction the first target, without addressing the chronic underlying deficiency of demand, is exactly the error of the 1930s. It will prolong the great recession, harm the social cohesion of the country, and continue inflicting unnecessary hardship on millions of Americans.

They join Paul Krugman, Brad DeLong and dozens of others. But even modest stimulative measures — a few billion for teachers’ jobs, or Medicaid funding, or expanded unemployment benefits — have faced a tough fight in the Senate. The next big stimulative opportunity will likely be the extension of the Bush tax cuts, though cutting tax has a much smaller multiplier than spending on things like unemployment benefits or food stamps, now known as SNAP. A dollar of tax cuts creates about $0.32 of economic activity, versus $1.61 for a dollar of unemployment benefits.

Under this new expedited procedure, the president would submit a package of rescissions shortly after a spending bill is passed. Congress would be required to consider these recommendations as a package, without amendment, and with a guaranteed up-or-down vote within a specified timeframe. The White House bills this as part of a larger effort the president has undertaken to rein in wasteful spending…. This expedited rescission authority would replace Part C of the Impoundment Control Act of 1974 — the line-item veto provisions struck down by the Supreme Court in 1998.

But the new proposal comes at the same time that members of Congress — Republicans and Democrats both — are pressing for spending cuts and pay-go provisions. Lori Montgomery and Shailagh Murray report in the Washington Post:

“It’s time to start paying for things,” said Rep. Kathy Dahlkemper (D-Pa.), a freshman who voted for last year’s economic stimulus bill but said she is likely to oppose the next spending package, scheduled to hit the House floor Tuesday. “We’ve done some good things, but one of the best things we could do right now is get control of our fiscal house.”

With the national debt at its highest level in nearly 60 years, the question of whether to cut spending — and if so, how — is pitting liberals against conservatives, and Congress against the president. The White House has proposed a three-year freeze in programs unrelated to national security and warned House leaders Friday that it might go further, targeting the Defense Department for cuts. Meanwhile, House leaders unable to agree on a long-term budget blueprint are considering other ways to signal fiscal toughness, including a one-year budget plan that would cut 2011 spending even more deeply than Obama’s freeze.

“We’re going to adopt that and may go farther,” said Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), a member of the House leadership.

Of course, having both the White House and Congress devising ways to slash government spending and cut benefits has economists worried. Consumer demand remains soft, and unemployment sky high. Until the economic cycle is virtuous and the turnaround clearly self-sustaining, the government reducing its budget could be disastrous. Someone needs to be spending for businesses to start hiring again, and if it is not the consumer, it needs to be Uncle Sam.

Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.) (Bob Larson/Contra Costa Times/ZUMA Press)

As Capitol Hill Democrats consider proposals to pull the country out of its huge deficit hole, they’re repeatedly running into a formidable impediment: themselves.

On issues as diverse as health care and student lending, provisions designed to rein in deficit spending have all run smack into the ubiquitous inclination of lawmakers to protect their home turf from the scalpel of budget cuts. Their message is familiar: Congress must do something to get its fiscal house in order, just don’t do it in my back yard. And party affiliation is largely irrelevant.

[Congress1] The most recent case surrounds a popular proposal to eliminate government subsidies to private companies that lend to students. The legislation, which has already passed the House and enjoys enthusiastic support from President Obama, would save the government tens of billions of dollars over the next decade — most of which would go toward expanding scholarships for low-income college students. Never an overly partisan issue, it was proposed by President Bush several times during his tenure. Senate Democrats are hoping to attach the legislation to their sweeping health care reform proposal.

Not so fast.

Those billions of dollars don’t go nowhere. And six Senate Democrats — Bill Nelson (Fla.), Blanche Lincoln (Ark.), Ben Nelson (Neb.), Mark Warner (Va.), Jim Webb (Va.) and Tom Carper (Del.) — voiced their objections to the proposal on Tuesday. The lawmakers — most representing hubs of large, private lenders — say they support student loan reform “to generate historic budget savings,” but have concerns that the White House proposal “could put jobs at risk.” They’re asking Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) to approach any action “in a thoughtful manner that considers potential alternative legislative proposals.”

Though short on specifics, the message is clear: The lawmakers want to rein in spending, but not if it threatens jobs in their states.

It’s an argument that’s applicable to almost every budget reform lawmakers tackle. That is, even if some industry, or project, or siphon of federal spending is utterly wasteful — even if it’s utterly pernicious — it’s still likely that somebody’s livelihood depends on it, and therefore someone in Congress is going to defend it. (Some examples include the fights over dropping the F-22 fighter jet; canceling the presidential helicopter; and forcing the automakers to keep dealerships around even if they weren’t selling cars).

In a more recent case, the Senate, as part of its health care bill, included creation of an independent commission empowered to recommend Medicare pay reforms if Congress didn’t do enough to control program costs. The recommendations would take effect unless Congress voted them down. Yet House Democrats are balking at the idea. Rep. Mike Capuano (D-Mass.), for example, sent a letter to supporters Thursday, saying he’s worried that the panel’s recommendations “would quickly and inevitably result in Massachusetts losing tens of thousands of jobs and would seriously undermine one of our region’s economic engines.”

“Other regions with heavy concentrations of health care would feel a similar impact,” he wrote.

Such resistance highlights the question facing leaders on Capitol Hill as they try to rein in federal deficits: How does Congress “generate historic budget savings” when thousands of jobs likely hinge on the spending?

The question is timely — and not only because the country is in the middle of a jobs crisis. The nation’s budget deficit hit $1.4 trillion last fiscal year and is on pace to top that figure this year. Much of that spending represents emergency measures enacted to address the recent economic downturn, the worst the country has suffered since the Great Depression. Yet even absent those temporary measures, federal spending remains on an unsustainable course, with Medicare and Medicaid alone threatening to swamp the federal budget in a few short decades.

Aiming to maximize tax dollars, the House passed a bill in September that would eliminate the Federal Family Education Loan program, or FFEL, under which the government subsidizes private lenders that cater to students. Instead, all loans would originate directly from the U.S. Treasury, though private lenders would still compete to service those loans. The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the provision to eliminate the for-profit middle man would alone save the federal government $67 billion over the next decade. The bill’s sponsor, Education and Labor Committee Chairman George Miller (D-Calif.), told reporters at the Capitol Thursday that the current system represents “a titanic boondoggle in excess subsidies to some of the nation’s rich and most powerful banks.”

Banks, he could have added, that employ large numbers of folks in a large number of states.

The regional protectionism is hardly limited to Democrats. When the White House last month proposed to cut an expensive defense contract in Alabama, for example, GOP Sen. Richard Shelby (Ala.) was quick to retaliate, placing a hold on every Obama nominee before the Senate. When President Bush vetoed a $300 billion farm bill in 2008 — citing taxpayer subsidies to wealthy farmers — it was Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.), among other farm-state Republicans, to rally the successful override. The list goes on.

Joshua Gordon, policy director for the Concord Coalition, a budget watchdog group, said the FFEL debate mirrors that over Medicare Advantage, the program under which private companies cater to Medicare patients. Each program represents “a system that everyone knows is inefficient,” Gordon said, but reforms have gone nowhere in Congress, largely due to the local interests of some members.

The reluctance of Congress to make difficult budget decisions, Gordon added, only bolsters the argument for an independent deficit commission “empowered to think of the country on the whole and not just individual districts.”

Then again, in bipartisan fashion, the Senate shot down such a proposal last month.

“There is one thing that often unifies Congress,” Gordon said, “and that is irresponsibility.”

President Barack Obama delivering his State of the Union; House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-Va.) and Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) (EPA/ZUMApress.com)

On December 9, House Republicans did what they’d done multiple times throughout 2009. They released an open letter to President Obama, laying out their ideas for a “No-Cost Jobs Plan.” It included, among ideas like scaled-back energy regulation and a temporary tax break for corporations repatriating foreign profits, a proposal for a “spending freeze.”

[GOP1] “A freeze in domestic discretionary spending,” they argued, “would immediately save $53 billion and more importantly demonstrate an immediate commitment to fiscal restraint.”

Over the next month, the “No-Cost Jobs Plan” remained a useful talking point for Republicans rebutting attacks on their “no” votes, a hook for op-eds, and not much else. But in early January, White House Budget Director Peter Orszag fueled speculation that the White House might want freezes in discretionary spending in the 2011 budget. On Monday night the White House leaked the news that President Obama would propose a three-year freeze on such spending, which makes up roughly one-sixth of the budget. In his State of the Union speech, the president confirmed it.

“Starting in 2011, we are prepared to freeze government spending for three years,” Obama said. “Like any cash-strapped family, we will work within a budget to invest in what we need and sacrifice what we don’t. And if I have to enforce this discipline by veto, I will.”

This sudden and hardly expected shift–using the language of personal responsibly that Republicans have used since before Obama took office–has startled members of both parties and economists both critical and supportive of White House policy. And while they’re using the opportunity to needle Democrats on a policy that’s seen as unlikely to shrink the deficit, conservatives see Obama’s decision as a partial declaration of surrender.

“I never met a spending freeze I didn’t like,” Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.), the chairman of the Republican conference, told TWI. He pointed to the December 9 letter and gave his party full credit for appearing to change the president’s mind on spending. “I’d welcome a sincere attempt at a spending freeze.”

“Step one is admitting you have a problem,” said Brad Dayspring, a spokesman for Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Va.), the GOP whip who co-signed the “No-Cost Jobs Plan” with Pence. “Step two is doing something about it. If the president’s come to his senses about spending being too high, we agree.”

As a short-term attempt to co-opt Republican rhetoric, the “spending freeze” promise is a success. The first poll on the idea, conducted by Rasmussen Reports, found a 56-24 percent majority in favor of a freeze, with a slim 48 percent plurality of voters predicting it would have at least “a little” impact on cutting the deficit. It followed multiple polls that have found the public skeptical that government spending can pull the economy out of the recession. That, according to some critics, explains why the White House would grab onto a Republican concept unlikely to have a major effect on the economy.

“It has to be evaluated on political terms,” said Bruce Bartlett, a conservative economist who has clashed with fellow travelers over his opposition to spending cuts in a bad economy. “What’s he trying to accomplish politically by saying this? He’s trying to give the appearance of moving to the middle. As policy, it’s too puny to have an effect even if it’s implemented.”

Bartlett argued that liberal economists’ concerns about the impact of any kind of spending freeze were “overwrought, because nothing will come of this. But Obama’s sending mixed signals to everybody–his own supporters as well–as to what exactly his economic philosophy is.”

Deficit hawks have taken the same approach to the “freeze” concept as Republicans. At best, it points to the right policy but doesn’t get there fast enough. At worst, it’s a distraction from more deeply-needed cuts.

“We wouldn’t oppose this,” said Josh Gordon, director of policy at the budget watchdog group The Concord Coalition. “It’s an acknowledgment that the deficit is a problem. You have to start somewhere. My concern is that too much political capital could be wasted on small items, and not enough could be spent on long-term challenges, like entitlement and defense spending.”

“Voters aren’t stupid,” said Alex Conant, a Republican strategist. (Conant’s client Tim Pawlenty called the “freeze” concept “kind of like somebody eating three Big Macs and then deciding they’re going to control their weight by ordering a Diet Coke.”) “The spending issue is not going anywhere, with or without this spending freeze. It only pertains to a small part of the budget, not even the fastest-growing part of the budget.”

Conant doubted that Obama had taken a Republican issue off the table for 2010, despite the instant polls. “Republicans do deserve credit for having the president acknowledge a problem,” he said. Other Republican strategists agreed that the “freeze” wouldn’t shift public opinion on which party can grapple with the deficit; one suggested that Obama’s embrace of the frame might make it easier for Republicans to run on government-cutting while dodging the tricky questions of entitlement or defense spending cuts.

“Ninety-five percent of Republican candidates, officials, staffers and advisers do not give a rat’s ass about fiscal restraint or government size,” one strategist told TWI. “At the end of the day, 95 percent of them believe people want to hear about fiscal restraint, but ultimately want government to give them stuff. This is how we default to talking about tax cuts, not spending, because everyone is afraid that if you criticize a spending item, you’ll offend someone. Well, you will. But when you bankrupt the whole country, which Obama’s proposal is not going to stop, you offend millions.”

Pence and other Republicans suggested that the “freeze” concept would come up again in a Friday meeting between the president and their party’s conference in Baltimore. Whatever the long-term political effect–whether or not a “freeze” happens–Obama critics are pleased that a year of arguments for more government spending are being swept aside.

“What he’s doing is actually pretty much what Bush didn’t have the guts to do in eight years,” said Veronique De Rugy, a libertarian economist at the Mercatus Center who has criticized the Keynesian spending policies of the Obama administration. “It’s nothing. But it’s more than Bush did.”

The plan already has critics upset over the scale of government spending it involves. Including, somewhat surprisingly, over at the Wall Street Journal’s Real Time Economics blog, they don’t think Obama is going far enough.

If economists are that nervous about things, maybe we should all be. From the blog:

The problem is not that this stimulus is too large, but rather that the entire Obama strategy now seems to be insufficiently bold.

Economists at Real Time say the Federal Reserve should adopt an aggressive, pro-inflation policy that makes wages and prices rise rather than fall; that the government should push to recapitalize banks or take them over; and that government should take a leading role in refinancing mortgages and managing foreclosures. Add all that to a stimulus plan, and it should work, they say:

The current emphasis on fiscal stimulus as the primary means of recovery is reasonable if we think that deflation is unavoidable or that any kind of moderate inflation would be an unacceptable price to pay for avoiding the Second Great Depression. The potential problem lies in failing to create the necessary conditions — positive inflation expectations, a healthy banking system, and an end to the housing bloodbath — for the fiscal stimulus to be successful.

So don’t just take Obama’s word for it today. When the WSJ economists start calling for bold action, you know things are bad.