I think TNR has this just right ...

The greatest risk for Democrats is not that Obama will try to do too much, but that their terror of failure will lead them to waste an historic opportunity. This is not a Clintonian moment. It is more like the moment Lyndon Johnson inherited in 1965, or the one Franklin Roosevelt faced in 1933--a chance to reshape American government. The Democrats have it in their grasp to master the great problems of public life if they can summon their collective nerve. The only thing they have to fear is fear itself.

This is why, perhaps paradoxically, I'm not overly concerned at the rumored cabinet appointments that have some people worried. For a strong-willed president, cabinet officers are there to execute the president's vision and plan. And experience in government is an asset in execution, if it can be detriment to breadth of vision and ambition.

Obama promised big things; and I take him at his word.

More on this later.

(Hat tip to Sullivan for the link.)