Being unwilling to rein in spending, Obama will soon be proposing further tax increases of a size that will dwarf the few tax breaks he is offering to small businesses that take on new workers. Nobody doubts that the commission the president is appointing to find a way out of the fiscal mess will recommend tax increases now, and spending cuts, if any, much later. Or that Congress might well decide to do neither, and Micawber-like, simply hope that something turns up.

That means we have an odd situation. We are to have jam today, this year, and perhaps even next, with the bill to come due shortly thereafter. If Obama has his way, that won't happen until after his re-election in 2012.

Voters in Switzerland have rejected a proposal to introduce a nationwide system of state-funded lawyers to represent animals in court.

Opponents had argued that Switzerland did not need more legislation. The government had opposed the idea.

Voters were almost certainly swayed by worries about how much such a system might cost taxpayers, and by objections from Switzerland's farmers already struggling with reduced subsidies and falling milk prices.

Californians know that something is wrong, and they also know that their elected officials ' at least operating under today's political dynamic ' can't even get themselves to stop digging a deeper hole. Few economists believe that the economy is poised to come roaring back, which would paper over the problems.

California appears headed toward a massive fiscal collapse.

According to a recent Rasmussen Poll , only 21 percent of American voters believe that the federal government enjoys the consent of the governed. On the other hand, Rasmussen notes, a full 63 percent of the "political class" believe that the government enjoys the consent of the governed.

It's tempting to stress the disconnect here, and that disconnect is certainly huge. Unsurprisingly, the political class -- which talks mostly to itself -- thinks that it is far more popular, and legitimate, in the eyes of the country than is in fact the case. In this, as in so many things, America's political class is out of touch with reality.

The once-heady brew of American freedom has become watery and unsatisfying.

In fact, when I think of the federal government's brand now, I think of Schlitz beer. Schlitz was once a top national brew. But, in search of short-term gains, it began gradually reducing its quality in tiny increments to save money, substituting cheaper malt, fewer hops and "accelerated" brewing for its traditional approach.

Each incremental decline was imperceptible to consumers, but after a few years, people suddenly noticed that the beer was no good anymore. Sales collapsed, and a "Taste My Schlitz" campaign designed to lure beer drinkers back failed when the "improved" brew turned out not to be any better. A brand image that had been accumulated over decades was lost in a few years, and it has never recovered.

The federal government, alas, finds itself in much the same position. The political class sold its legitimacy off in drips and drabs. As "smart politics" has come over the past decades to mean not persuasion but the practice of legerdemain, the use of political deals, cover from a friendly press apparat and taking advantage of voters' rational ignorance, the governing classes have managed to achieve things that would surely have failed had the people known what was going on.

But though each little trick may have slipped by the voters, the voters have nonetheless noticed that the ultimate product isn't what it used to be. The end result, as with Schlitz, is a tarnished brand. And rescuing tarnished brands is hard.

Now 32, Mosab is the son of Sheikh Hassan Yousef, a founder and leader of the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas. Throughout the last decade, from the second Intifada to the current stalemate, he worked alongside his father in the West Bank. During that time the younger Mr. Yousef also secretly embraced Christianity. And as he reveals in his book "Son of Hamas," out this week, he became one of the top spies for Israel's internal security arm, the Shin Bet.

As the son of a Muslim cleric, he says he had reached the conclusion that terrorism can't be defeated without a new understanding of Islam. Here he echoes other defectors from Islam such as the former Dutch parliamentarian and writer Ayaan Hirsi Ali.

Do you consider your father a fanatic? "He's not a fanatic," says Mr. Yousef. "He's a very moderate, logical person. What matters is not whether my father is a fanatic or not, he's doing the will of a fanatic God. It doesn't matter if he's a terrorist or a traditional Muslim. At the end of the day a traditional Muslim is doing the will of a fanatic, fundamentalist, terrorist God. I know this is harsh to say. Most governments avoid this subject. They don't want to admit this is an ideological war.

"The problem is not in Muslims," he continues. "The problem is with their God. They need to be liberated from their God. He is their biggest enemy. It has been 1,400 years they have been lied to."

Amid the right's hysterical repudiation of everything President Obama has done or wants to do, one legitimate concern stands out: that Washington will grow without limits. The federal government's size, scope, and power have historically taken big leaps in reaction to war and financial crisis. It's not unreasonable to worry that, in responding to the biggest economic slump since the Great Depression while fighting two wars, the United States will find itself with a more expensive, more intrusive public sector and a less free and dynamic private one.

A government that constitutes half of a country's economy, like those in Western European, produces a very different society over time than one that eats up only a third of the economy. Obama may have assumed that hard times and the clear imperative for a strong response to the financial crisis would suspend the underlying dynamic of suspicion toward Washington.

If so, he misjudged something fundamental about American political culture. Even now that the fear of excessive, irreversible public-sector growth has provoked an agenda-stalling backlash and resulted in serious people claiming that his proposals equate to socialism, Obama has yet to clarify his ambiguous view of government's role.

At this point, Obama and the Democrats may be destined to learn the old lesson once again. But if they hope to avoid a repeat of Clinton's 1994 fate in 2010, the president and his party might think about fixing a long-term upper limit on the size of government. Because of the bank bailouts and stimulus, federal spending will exceed 25 percent of GDP this year, and public spending at all levels will exceed 44 percent.

But if liberals were clear that, in normal times, federal spending shouldn't be more than 22 percent and that the public sector as a whole shouldn't exceed a third of GDP'the level during Clinton's second term'the fear of Democrats covertly foisting a social-democratic model on America would begin to melt away. This kind of ceiling would mean that government couldn't grow at the expense of the economy, because it couldn't grow faster than the economy as a whole. To substantiate his commitment, Obama should unilaterally propose large, specific cuts in programs and subsidies to be phased in as the need for stimulus spending recedes. Raising the retirement age, privatizing space exploration, and eliminating agriculture subsidies would make a decent start.

Beyond actually endorsing smaller government, Obama could identify himself with wiser government by developing the responsibility theme he sounded in his inaugural address but has returned to infrequently in the period since. Health care reform based on an individual mandate is a good example of government linking a private duty to a public benefit, but Obama hasn't emphasized this "values" aspect of the plan.

There's a risk of harming the country by failing to address fundamental threats and problems'which is where current Republican policies would leave us. There's also a risk of Democrats responding in a way that leaves behind more government than we want or need. Obama could help himself by letting people know he's worried about that danger too.

The federal government has awarded more than $107 billion in contract payments, grants and other benefits over the past decade to foreign and multinational American companies while they were doing business in Iran, despite Washington's efforts to discourage investment there, records show.

But a New York Times analysis of federal records, company reports and other documents shows that both the Obama and Bush administrations have sent mixed messages to the corporate world when it comes to doing business in Iran, rewarding companies whose commercial interests conflict with American security goals.
Many of those companies are enmeshed in the most vital elements of Iran's economy. More than two-thirds of the government money went to companies doing business in Iran's energy industry ' a huge source of revenue for the Iranian government and a stronghold of the increasingly powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, a primary focus of the Obama administration's proposed sanctions because it oversees Iran's nuclear and missile programs.

Other companies are involved in auto manufacturing and distribution, another important sector of the Iranian economy with links to the Revolutionary Guards.

With a third of precincts counted by Saturday afternoon, election officials said President Faure Gnassingb??, the son of the former dictator, had 51 percent of the vote. The main opposition candidate, Jean-Pierre Fabre, had nearly 49 percent of votes.

Mr. Fabre claimed victory on Friday, the day after the vote, and accused the governing party of trying to rig the election, setting the stage for a violent showdown as vote counting began Saturday.

Togo has been ruled by the same family for the past 43 years and has never had a vote that was considered free or fair. Opposition supporters are vowing to take to the streets in huge protests if the ruling family tries to steal this election.

On Friday, an angry mob crowded outside the campaign headquarters where Mr. Fabre was speaking, chanting 'Change or death.'

'Togo will burn,' said Charlotte Lelatou, 57, an opposition supporter. 'We're tired. We want a change.'

Mr. Gnassingb??, 43, was installed as president by the military, which seized control of the country immediately after the death of Mr. Gnassingb'??s father on Feb. 5, 2005. Mr. Gnassingb?? won an election later that year that was widely viewed as fraudulent and in which the military systematically stole ballot boxes from polling stations.