Buyer's remorse XII

Chris Buckley
David Brooks
Kathleen Parker
Stuart Taylor
David Gergen
Clive Crook
Andrew Grove
Megan McArdle
Michael Gerson
William Galston
David Broder

Today is David Ignatius.....

For all the legislative commotion surrounding the economic crisis, we are still living in the equivalent of "the phony war" of 1939 and 1940. War has been declared on the Great Recession, but it's basically politics as usual. The bickering and mismanagement that helped create the crisis are continuing, even though we elected a president who promised a new start.

History tells us that phony war doesn't last forever and that when it ends, all hell breaks loose. World War II officially began with Germany's September 1939 attack on Poland, but for months it was just skirmishing on the sidelines. That hiatus ended on May 10, 1940, when Hitler invaded Belgium and its neighbors. Neville Chamberlain was out as British prime minister, and Winston Churchill arrived as the avenging angel.

We're still in the Neville Chamberlain phase when it comes to the economic crisis. The government is talking about sacrifice and solutions, but it hasn't yet made the tough decisions that will put the economy back together. Economist David Smick had it right in The Post this week when he said the administration had a three-pronged strategy: delay, delay and delay. The administration announces a rescue package but doesn't deliver details; it promises budget discipline but saves the hard decisions for later.

One reason this season feels so political is that Obama has stacked his administration with politicians and former government officials. You might think that with the greatest financial crisis of his lifetime, the president would want a few business leaders with experience managing large organizations in crisis. But no.

Here's the un-businesslike Obama Cabinet: At Treasury, a former government official; at State, a former senator; at Commerce, a former governor; at Defense, a former government official and university president; at Energy, a former professor; at Homeland Security, a former governor; at Health and Human Services, a former governor; at the White House as chief of staff, a former congressman; at the White House as economic czar, a former university president and government official.

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