President Obama has been jetting around the country, warning of untold pain and suffering starting today when the sequester budget cuts kick in. But if he really buys his own gloom and doom, there is a way he can avoid major cuts for the rest of the fiscal year: Recall the outstanding Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP, bailout money that General Motors and his Wall Street pals are still sitting on.

The sequester deal, as Bob Woodward has reminded us, was proposed by the president 18 months ago to persuade congressional fiscal hawks to raise the debt ceiling. Meanwhile, Congress had an opportunity to find alternatives to the automatic, across-the-board cuts (or sequester), but it failed.