It isn’t so much the spending plan. It’s the seeming utter lack of any real plan that has the markets spooked. The Administration has showcased an apparently endless stream of imbeciles who have no idea how the money will be spent, why spending money in some ways rather than others might help the economy, and who are generally clueless about the causes of the current predicament as well as about any possible solutions to it.

Uncertainty and incompetence are what is driving the markets lower.

The Chief’s jet-setting campaign appearances around the country aren’t helping, either. The time for platitudes uttered to high school audiences is long past over. It’s time for specifics, and specifics - along with any sort of understanding - seem to be sorely lacking.

Worse: the general public has now had time to ponder the rushed-through spending package, and they don’t like what they’re seeing. So add a great big dollop of consumer pessimism on top of everything else, ensuring that people are going to clutch onto their 17 dollar a week “stimulus” rather than spend it, and you’ve got the beginnings of a long, dark hunker.