Washington Is Waking Up to Public's Spending Fears

GOP needs to build consensus for cuts—and win back White House
By Rob Quinn,  Newser Staff
Posted Feb 19, 2010 9:33 AM CST
Washington Is Waking Up to Public's Spending Fears
President Barack Obama signs an executive order creating the bipartisan National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform yesterday.   (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

President Obama may be just trying to save his political life with the creation of a bipartisan commission on government spending but the move shows Washington is waking up to the public's worries, writes Peggy Noonan. Concerns about federal spending and its implications for America's future have, just in time, spread from "cranky right-wingers" to the center and the whole nation, Noonan writes in the Wall Street Journal.

The Republicans can build on this and make real changes possible, Noonan writes, but they will need win public support for fair and specific cuts in federal spending. They'll likely need to have the presidency to do this, she notes, and it will take a strong and gifted president. "The good news is the new consensus that America must move forward in a new way to get spending under control," Noonan writes. "The bad news is we don't trust Washington to do it. And in the end, only Washington can." (More Peggy Noonan stories.)

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