The Professor Takes the Gloves Off By Terrence McNally, AlterNet November 12, 2003 Accustomed in economic circles to calling a stupid argument a stupid argument, and isolated (in Princeton, New Jersey) from the Washington dinner-party circuit, Paul Krugman has become the most prominent voice in the mainstream U.S. media to openly and repeatedly accuse George Bush of lying to the American people to sell budget-busting tax cuts and a pre-emptive and nearly unilateral war. Krugman cannot be dismissed by opponents as some dyed-in-the-wool lefty. He's a moderate academic economist who's been radicalized by the Bush White House and the right wing it represents. Krugman joined The New York Times in 1999 as a columnist on the op-ed Page and continues as professor of Economics and International Affairs at Princeton University. His new book, "The Great Unraveling: Losing Our Way In The New Century" (#9 on the New York Times best-seller list and a top seller on Amazon) is a collection of his op-ed pieces from January 2000-January 2003. McNally: How did your role in the op-ed pages of The New York Times happen and how has it evolved? Krugman: I was brought on to write about "my real home," economics and business, specifically international economics. There were a lot of international crises in the '90s and The Times thought I'd be writing about policies and disasters overseas, as well as about stuff at home, typically the follies of the new economy. But it was election season, and it pretty quickly became clear to me – and more and more so as we went along – that the really scary follies, the potential disasters that were the greatest risks of concern were at home. I came on thinking it would be a largely non-political column. I think The Times thought that, too. And then during the campaign, because I knew my stuff – basically, because I could do my own arithmetic – I found myself saying: "You know, these guys are lying...This is a fundamentally irresponsible and dishonest economic program." Then after the election it increasingly became clear to me that it wasn't just economics. So it's a very strange thing. I'm no wild-eyed radical. Actually, The American Prospect, a very liberal magazine, ran a story in the mid-90s attacking me for my support of Free Trade. McNally: I remember that. Krugman: So I was kind of a bad guy from the point of view of more consistently reliable commentators on the left. But of course now all of that seems insignificant compared with the awesomeness of the fraud that they [the Bush Administration] are trying to perpetrate on all of us...
I like Krugman a lot, but there are a few things he bugs me on. For one, in his book he slams Nader as being overly paranoid about corporate fraud and so called "free trade." That's it, no real substance to the personal attack. Mind you, it doesn't take much to flip back 100 pages in the book to the many chapters Krugman has just written in which he goes on and on about how the corporate scandals of the 90s took "everyone" by surprise, and how he had no clue it could have gotten so bad, etc. A little consistency, Paul. I also think he tends towards the dramatic, like the time on Charlie Rose that I saw him predict America could be a 3rd world country pretty soon if the deficit isn't fixed. (Granted, there are aspects of American today that are 3rd worldish, but that wasn't his point. He was seriously talking about the whole place.) Anyway, there are a couple other things that I have minor quibbles with, but generally I'd say he's enlightening a good 80-90% of the time.
Sorry to tear down one of your heroes at the NY Times, but Krugman is sloppy with his statistics and completely one-sided on the Times' Op/Ed. page. The truth about Krugman: http://www.nationalreview.com/nrof_luskin/truthsquad090803.asp
(1) Don't read the NYT (2) Find it interesting that you think that Krugman is a hero of mine. Sorry; my only hero is my dad, my only heroine, my blessed mother. (3) Your analysis come from a website selling the "Talking Coulter" doll, and from a guy whose known as "the ticthat sticks to Krugman's ass." In reality, Luskin is Yale dropout whose claim to fame is first starting a graphics design company, and then riding the Clinton eco-boom with Barclay's...he spends the vast majority of his so-called "article" making childish fun of Krugman...what a waste of time this guy is...and his message merits even less attention. (4) As far as your "left-right" spectrum goes, Krugman isn't even left; he's center, probably center with a shade right. It shows you how *#*#*#*#ing skewed the discourse is in America; here you have Krugman, who is nowhere near "left," or progressive, and righties and far-righties come out of the woodwork to rip this guy to shreds...as if in fear of him. What we should all fear is that the bombastic childishness and "gimme-gimme or I'll takee-takee" mentality of the right adn far-right is where the entirety of the media-based discourse lay... Likewise, the Dems are center, allowing the Repubs, in order to more clearly define themselves next to New Dems like CLinton, to move to the extreme right. Among those two parties, that's where the discussion is; solution? ignore those two parties; they are not representative of the people of this nation, but rather represent narrow interests to which the greed-based among us aspire...
Wow, Pizza. Is that really your idea of "tearing down" someone? Basically, the guy's whole argument rests on this idea: "Phew. When he's on camera, Krugman is (like many bookish academics) not nearly as impressive or intimidating as when you read his columns." That's it. Whoa. He's figured out that Krugman is an elfish looking, shifty eyed, stammering public speaker. I came to the same conclusion when I saw Krugman on Charlie Rose. So what? He's a bona fide economic genius (and Right/Center on those issues, btw--though I'd disagree with Mel and say that Krugman is pretty left on most other things), and he's got an astute political mind. Now if liberals were hoping he was going to host some O'Reilly Factor type lefty spin show, then I'd say this guy "tore" that idea to shreds. Otherwise, just lots of sound and fury. And what exactly do you mean by accusing him of being "one sided" on an Op/Ed page? Do you know what Op/Ed pages are?
I do. And a thinking person doesn't dismiss one side's policies out of hand as Krugman routinely does in his column. Plenty of people on the right were critical of Clinton but many agreed with policies like welfare reform and deficit reduction. Krugman & Dowd might be smart but I sense that their roles are clearly defined as Bush attack dogs for the NY Times. It gets as old as the Clinton conspiracy theories that were bandied about in the 90s. And did you read any of the factual errors this "economic genius" routinely makes? Economists are supposed to be experts with numbers and he's somewhat sloppy. I won't even get into Krugman's grudging acceptance of the anti-semitic comments of the Malaysian leader because he's considered "progressive" in the Muslim world and the speech was just as critical of fellow Muslim leaders. Just pathetic.
Boy, you really didn't get the point of that column, eh? And the fact you take media reviews from the Nat'l Review seriously is something...
I guess the ADL didn't get the point either: http://www.adl.org/media_watch/newspapers/20031021-NYTimes.htm But it's perfectly fine for people to post articles by Salon and commondreams?
For a different perspective, the Economist has what I would say is a fairly balanced look at Krugman here.
I just rememberd the other thing about about Krugman that bothers me: his tendency towards hyperbole when praising the Clinton years. That's something that afflicts Moore and Franken as well, but it seems even more over the top in Krugman.