When Barack Obama asked Congress to pass a massive economic-stimulus bill last January, he offered Republicans outstretched arms, saying he wanted to seek "solutions that advance not the interests of any party, or the agenda of any one group, but the aspirations of all Americans." Ten months later, he is asking for perhaps $200 billion more, but this time he comes ready to rumble.
In a Dec. 8 speech at the Brookings Institution, he wrapped his new stimulus plans in a partisan critique, charging that Republicans "presided over the decision-making that had led to the crisis" and...