Many Europeans are finding that austerity measures–cutting your way out of a deep recession–are not yielding the recovery that was promised.  Will that message find its way to politicians  in the United States, where deep cuts  in public service jobs have produced a lot of pain, but not much economic recovery.

President Obama apparently broke an unwritten rule that only Republicans can brag about foreign policy acheivements when he accented the anniversary of his hunting down Osama Bin Laden.  The GOP went into total outrage mode.  After all, killing Bin Laden doesn’t fit into the long-time GOP meme that Democrats are weak-kneed wimps who go around the world apologizing to everyone.