In writing about the work of the bogus "supercommittee" that Congress is using to cover its latest budget shenanigans, Krugman tries to convince us that the Wise Democrats are trying to save the economy even thought the Evil Republicans are trying to throw even more Americans out of work:
In Democrat-world, up is up and down is down. Raising taxes increases revenue, and cutting spending while the economy is still depressed reduces employment. But in Republican-world, down is up. The way to increase revenue is to cut taxes on corporations and the wealthy, and slashing government spending is a job-creation strategy.So, at least Krugman is now willing to part with some of the Holy Doctrines of Keynesianism and advocate tax increases during a depression. (Herbert Hoover and Congress massively raised taxes "on the rich" in 1932, and we know how well that turned out, but since Krugman wants us to believe that the Progressive Hoover was radically laissez-faire, that is a bit of history that Krugman manages to shove down the Orwellian Memory Hole.)
Of course, Krugman also decides to rewrite more recent history, that being the state of the economy in 2000. The Great One declares:
Remember, the U.S. fiscal outlook was pretty good in 2000, but, as soon as Republicans gained control of the White House, they squandered the surplus on tax cuts and unfunded wars.I will agree with him on the wars and I always have been on the record as opposing them, but at least I never have tried to write that wars also can create a "fiscal stimulus." However, one might just forget that in 2000, the infamous Stock Market Bubble popped, and for all of Krugman's claims that the Clinton administration was the soul of responsibility, its credit-fueled boom of the late 1990s could not be sustained.
However, Krugman wants us to forget that part, just as he has seen fit to rewrite the history of financial deregulation in order to fit his partisan agenda. Now, it is one thing for someone like Paul Begala to claim that the U.S. economy was in perfect shape in 2000, and that the recession of 2001 was the result of the Bush administration "talking down the economy."
However, Begala is nothing but a partisan hack, a shill for a political party, and he has about as much credibility as Karl Rove. I am not shocked or even upset when Begala acts like a political operative any more than I am surprised when my dogs bark at strangers. Dogs bark, and political operatives lie, as such things are in the DNA of both.
It is disconcerting, however, when an "elite" academic economist tries to outdo someone like Begala. As for the "super committee," it is bound to fail not because Democrats are Crusaders for Right And Truth and Republicans are the Second Coming of Darth Vader, but because delusion reigns in Congress, the White House, and in the economics department at Princeton University.
This committee will fail because no one on it is willing to face up to the fact that the U.S. Government has brought disaster upon the economy and except for a few lonely prophets in the House of Representatives (who are openly disdained for their courage), no one in Washington is willing to admit that this current path is not sustainable. The "cuts" in spending are laughable, since they only would be cutting some of the proposed INCREASES in spending. (Only in Washington and at Princeton is a smaller increase in spending called a "cut.")
Yes, failure will come not because Democrats are good and Republicans are evil, but rather because Democrats and Republicans refuse to recognize how they have run this country into utter insolvency.
