Obama's Agenda: Too Much, Too Many, Too Fast?

This week, it's health care, with President Obama staging another "White House summit" to kick-start his latest drive to reorder a fundamental element of American life.

One day earlier, he unveiled a massive new widget designed to manage all the contracts the U.S. government signs with businesses. Projected savings: $40 billion. How well will it do? No way to know until you fire it up.

In the previous week, Obama held a "fiscal responsibility" summit, wowed a joint session of Congress with tales of dire straits and high hopes, and wheeled out a new federal budget one-third larger than any before it. And to round out the week, he set a date for ending the six-year-old U.S. combat mission in Iraq (getting major ups from an audience of Marines).

In its earliest days, the fledgling Obama administration had tackled the banking crisis and the home mortgage structure and served notice it was prepared to go to great lengths to save the auto industry and bring the financial markets back under regulatory control.

Few can doubt that the weeks ahead will bring still more summits -- on energy and the environment, for example, and other topics -- closely followed by major makeover plans for federal policy in both arenas.

Have mercy! We're still not even halfway to that First 100 Days milestone that's so dear to us in the media.

Not that the Oval Office dynamo shows any signs of slowing down. He has not yet begun to fight on many fronts, and these days nearly every front seems to be spoiling for a fight.

As a result, the man and his minions seem afflicted at times with AADD: adult attention deficit disorder. At a minimum, the new crew would seem well advised to pace itself. Even those who admire the energy and ambition of the new administration have to stop and ask whether this is all too much, too soon.

For those who reflect further, the question soon becomes one of cost. Can all these rescues be done as the economy weakens dramatically? Are we burdening ourselves and future generations with debts that will come back to beggar us?

And for the more immediate present, is this any way to accomplish such a historically ambitious agenda?

Most of us would lean toward a more conventional approach. Tackle the most pressing problems first -- the credit system, the banks and the home mortgages that dragged them both down. Then perhaps more time could be devoted to a tax-cutting, job-creating stimulus plan and a budget that propped up demand while the consumer took a breather.

Beyond that, there could be time to devise new regulatory schemes, new methods of federal procurement, a new war policy and a plan for Middle East peace. You could study the health care system, and the energy-environment conundrum, and learn a lot about both over the course of a year or two. Blue-ribbon commissions could convene, organize, hire staff and issue reports.

One thing at a time, all in good time. Regular order. Slow and steady wins the race.

But that would not be the Obama Way, or more precisely the New Obama Way.

During the campaign we called him "No Drama Obama" -- the picture of cool, running on his own timetable and refusing to be rushed or thrown off stride. He often seemed to have all the time in the world.

But once the election was over, and especially since Inauguration Day, the same 47-year-old has been moving at the political equivalent of the speed of light. Now he seems to have not a moment to lose. Deadlines close in from all directions. It is as though he can solve no problem unless he moves to solve them all at once.

Solve the economy first? No, says Peter Orszag, the new budget director and another of the Obama wunderkinder. The single biggest obstacle to restarting the economy is the cost of health care, says he, and that means you can't do the one without the other.

The crises cohere, like sections of a Rubik's cube, interlocking and defying solution. Except that ultimately the solution depends on ingenious coordination of all the sections -- none of which can be neglected.

No, you cannot spend the same dollars more than once. But the dollars you spend on saving energy and improving the environment can also create jobs and contribute to lower health costs -- all at the same time.

That kind of synergy may still be more a dream than a formula, but it is a dream the Obama administration is counting on. And it may be our best national hope for the years ahead.

There is an old adage that if you want a job done you should give it to the busiest person available. Busy people tend to be more task-oriented, more efficient and effective. They invite responsibility because they respond to it. People with little to do and time on their hands may in fact have all they can handle.

Right now this country has committed itself to testing the wisdom of that adage. And a great deal rides on the outcome.