Well, that didn't take long...
The White House was forced to explain why its stimulus plan did not stop unemployment from rising above 8 percent, as it said in January that it would. White House economists said that forecast was consistent with independent predictions at the time and did not account for just how deep the recession really was in the last quarter of last year--in other words, under Mr. Bush.
"The recession just turned out to be deeper than was predicted," Mr. Axelrod said.
Without the Obama plan, the White House argued, it would be even worse today.
Along with "saved jobs," this statement is, of course, impossible to actually prove or disprove. But it will be the mantra from now on, no matter how bad things get or how many Obama economic predictions fall by the wayside.