Barack Obama’s presidency is off to an impressive start. Far from seeming daunted by the economic conditions he inherited from his predecessor, Mr Obama has maintained the posture, so familiar from his election campaign, of purposeful energy, steady calm and preternatural self-confidence. Polls say he continues to enjoy strong personal support. Although his policies are a little less widely admired, the country is behind him and wants him to succeed.

After so brief a time, it is frivolous to insist on solid achievement, though Mr Obama does have some to boast of. Congress passed an enormous fiscal stimulus that was much along the lines he first requested. Its design could have been better, and if anything it should have been bigger, but few would have been willing to bet last November that Mr Obama would succeed as well as he did on this issue. On the unfinished business of financial stabilisation, the record is less good. But here Mr Obama is entitled to ask for patience: this is a really difficult problem and, much as his critics may deny it, one that admits of no easy solution.