Amid good news, can Democrats talk down the economy?

"The recession talk in late 2018 got way, way out of hand," the New York Times economic reporter Neil Irwin tweeted a few days ago. Indeed it did.

Irwin's tweet came shortly after the government released figures showing the economy grew at a 3.2% annual rate in the first three months of this year. The number was good by anyone's measure, significantly outpacing predictions. And it raised a question: What about all that recession talk of the last few months? What was going on?

Certainly there were some economists who looked at various indicators — housing, energy, the international economy — and feared an economic slowdown was on the way. But in the popular conversation, the world of columnists and cable TV talkers, much of the economic chatter was really about President Trump. A worsening economy, some said, would show how wrong the president's policies have been and would be the worst possible news for his 2020 re-election bid.

"A recession is coming. Trump will make it so much worse," announced the Washington Post on Dec. 23 of last year. A slowdown is "overdue," columnist Catherine Rampell wrote, "and the eventual collapse may bear Trump's fingerprints."

"Trump and the slowing economy: A wounded tiger is a dangerous tiger," read the headline of a column, also in the Post, by former Obama economic adviser Jared Bernstein on Nov. 21, 2018.