Change, meet crisis

The gathering economic storm prompted Obama to add several emergency measures to his platform. These included rebates of up to $1,000 per family, to be funded from a windfall profits tax on oil companies and pitched as a "down payment on the middle-class tax cut" he had already promised -- although oil company profits are likely to fall if world petroleum prices continue to decline.

He also proposed a $25-billion jobs fund for highway and other infrastructure projects and another $25 billion in revenue sharing to help state and local governments keep essential services afloat in a time of declining tax revenue.

The Illinois senator also began to temper his promise that every spending initiative would be revenue-neutral -- that is, paid for either by a reduction in spending elsewhere or through higher tax receipts.

"It's clear that as events have become more dire, he's become bolder," said Robert Kuttner, founding co-editor of the American Prospect, a liberal journal, and a sometime advisor to the Obama campaign. "This is a race between how bold he's willing to be and how fast the economy is cratering."

The economic slowdown is likely to bring more pleas for emergency spending to the new president's desk, even outside the stimulus package being crafted now on Capitol Hill. As car sales sink, the automobile industry might seek loans or loan guarantees beyond the $25-billion package approved by Congress last month.

With falling home prices and rising foreclosures at the epicenter of the economic crisis, mortgage holders and home builders are likely to be the focus of a broad range of initiatives. Obama earlier proposed a mortgage tax credit for homeowners who don't already receive an income tax deduction because they don't itemize, but more aggressive relief may be sought.

Some advisors argue that a potentially severe recession only underscores the need for a far-reaching stimulus plan focused on infrastructure more than on rebates to spark a short-term bump in consumer spending.

"We don't need more consumption," Joseph Stiglitz, an economics professor at Columbia University and an advisor to the campaign, said recently on financial news channel CNBC. "Infrastructure is where we've starved the economy. This is an opportunity at the national level to say, 'Here are all the things we should have been doing and now have to do to get our economy to grow."