By Stefan Theil

As governments throw around hundreds of billions of dollars, pounds and yuans to rescue the global economy—dwarfed by China’s $586 billion spending plan and Obama’s expected $700 billion plan—the critics of deficit spending have kept mostly to the shadows recently. Today, however, they took center stage—call it the Great Pushback. It wasn’t just deficit hawks in the U.S. Senate, who voted down the $15 billion bailout for Detroit automakers. In Europe, a battle is raging over whether spending in an appropriate response to the economic crisis.

The dispute centers on comments made by Germany’s finance minister, who ridiculed British plans to spend $30 billion to stimulate its economy as “crass Keynesianism.” The barb could just as well have been directed at similar plans in the United States, China and at the whole notion of government spending to stimulate the economy. Germany, which is known for fiscal rectitude and a savings rate that puts Americans to shame, leads a small group of European countries, including Poland, that are balking at coughing up the vast sums Europe’s leaders believe is needed.

The Germans insist they don't underestimate the depth of the crisis, but disagree about the risks of massively hiking government debt for what they see as ineffective and wasteful programs. German Finance Minister Peer Steinbrück, in an interview with Newsweek, said it was "breathtaking" to watch the speed at which supply-siders and fiscal conservatives were willing to "toss around billions." The centerpiece of the British plan, a 13-month temporary cut in the national sales tax from 17.5 to 15 percent, would have no effect other than saddle future generations of Brits with enormous deficits, Steinbrück warned.

Steinbrück's comments raised the hackles of British Prime Minister Gordon Brown. He lashed back at the Germans, calling them out of step with the rest of the world for their pestering reminders about the dangers of easy money and deficits. (For the record: Despite the rhetoric, the Germans have their own $41 billion spending plan in addition to a $670 billion bank bailout fund, but oppose having to put up money for a bigger, coordinated European effort for now. Their budget is balanced, Germans have had no housing or credit bubble, no wealth effect as few Germans invest in equities, and jobs are only now starting to get hit because of falling exports.)

Steinbrück may have been criticizing Britain, but his complaints are aimed at all the big spenders for feeding illusions about what he derides as "The Great Rescue Plan." His boss, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, last week also insisted Germany would refuse "to participate in this senseless race for billions" and that she was "deeply concerned" that the policy of cheap money and massive deficit spending in the U.S. and elsewhere risked repeating the very mistakes that precipitated the crisis. (See Newsweek's story about Germany's Mrs. No.) It’s strange that America's remaining fiscal conservatives now find themselves joined by a German Social Democrat like Steinbrück, who said a few months ago that Karl Marx wasn't so far off when he described the failings of financial capitalism. Is Steinbrück a voice of reason, or are he and other fiscal conservatives just fiddling as the world burns? With the crisis like a fog before us, the jury is still out.