Shots fired

... many liberals have changed their views in response to new evidence. It’s an interesting experience; conservatives should try it some time.
    -- PK

Line of the Day: 2015-05-04

Maybe, just maybe, that was a sustainable argument four decades ago, but at this point it should be obvious that middle-class values only flourish in an economy that offers middle-class jobs.
    -- Paul Krugman

Line of the Day: 2014-05-06

Oh, sorry — I forgot that I wasn’t writing jokes for the White House Correspondents’ Dinner.
    -- Paul Krugman

Line of the Day: 2014-03-11

Still, I guess this ["hunger=dignity speech"] is a further nail in the coffin of [Paul] Ryan’s reputation as Serious, Honest Conservative. But I am of course a shrill bad guy, because I was guilty of premature anti-Ryanism — you weren’t supposed to figure out that he was a con man until 2011 or 2012.
    -- Paul Krugman

(previously in shrill)

[Added] More debunking of Ryan's speech from Jon Stewart, et al.

Why does Paul Krugman have to be right about everything?

Dunno. But he is.

Another problem, it seems to me, is that there just aren't that many ways (besides ground) to buy turkey, year-round, in the typical grocery store at least.

Fun fact of the day

An excerpt from "The Chutzpah Caucus:"

... Keynesian economics says not just that you should run deficits in bad times, but that you should pay down debt in good times. And it’s silly to imagine that this will happen, right?

Wrong. The key measure you want to look at is the ratio of debt to G.D.P., which measures the government’s fiscal position better than a simple dollar number. And if you look at United States history since World War II, you find that of the 10 presidents who preceded Barack Obama, seven left office with a debt ratio lower than when they came in. Who were the three exceptions? Ronald Reagan and the two George Bushes. So debt increases that didn’t arise either from war or from extraordinary financial crisis are entirely associated with hard-line conservative governments.

Paul Krugman's lament

Does a continuing depression actually serve the interests of the wealthy? That’s doubtful, since a booming economy is generally good for almost everyone. What is true, however, is that the years since we turned to austerity have been dismal for workers but not at all bad for the wealthy, who have benefited from surging profits and stock prices even as long-term unemployment festers. The 1 percent may not actually want a weak economy, but they’re doing well enough to indulge their prejudices.

And this makes one wonder how much difference the intellectual collapse of the austerian position will actually make. To the extent that we have policy of the 1 percent, by the 1 percent, for the 1 percent, won’t we just see new justifications for the same old policies?

I hope not; I’d like to believe that ideas and evidence matter, at least a bit. Otherwise, what am I doing with my life?

Sorry to steal your conclusion, Prof. K., but I know everyone will like seeing it again from the start.

Thank the FSM for Paul Krugman, is all I can say

[Edit] I tried in the first version of this post to quote "just a few samples" from Prof K's latest column, but it got silly -- I think I ended up managing to leave out two thes and an and.

So, please, just go read it, and, more importantly, send it to all of those friends and relatives of yours who try to tell you how we're doomed because {purported parallel example involving some individual household's finances}.

Line of the Day: 2013-03-03

You've heard about the conservative pundits taking money from certain Malaysians to write favorable things about certain Malaysians, and unfavorable things about certain other Malaysians, in America? Featuring the comedy stylings of Josh "You Must Include The Tilde To Show How I Am Not Racist" Treviño and his ignorance of the ignorantia juris non excusat principle?

Quick overview here, if not.

And now for the LotD.

It seems that some years ago Malaysia’s ruling party took a good look at leading pundits and policy intellectuals in the conservative movement, reached a judgment about their personal and intellectual integrity or lack thereof, and acted in accordance with that judgment.

Funny how Malaysia gets who these people are and what motivates them — while our own press corps doesn’t.

-- Paul Krugman

PK includes in this gimlet-eyed view some observations on the Heritage Foundation's related antics.

Whoops. Should have warned you to sit down there first, as the man says.

[Added] Speaking of whom, we now have a tie for LotD:

"According to Rich Lowry in Politico" is a phrase which proves Chomsky's idea that mastering the fundamental structures of language allows you to invent statements more horrible than you thought possible.

Line of the Day: 2013-02-13

O.K., at this point the conventions of punditry call for saying something to demonstrate my evenhandedness, something along the lines of “Democrats do it too.” But while Democrats, being human, often read evidence selectively and choose to believe things that make them comfortable, there really isn’t anything equivalent to Republicans’ active hostility to collecting evidence in the first place.

The truth is that America’s partisan divide runs much deeper than even pessimists are usually willing to admit; the parties aren’t just divided on values and policy views, they’re divided over epistemology. One side believes, at least in principle, in letting its policy views be shaped by facts; the other believes in suppressing the facts if they contradict its fixed beliefs.
    -- ibid

Emph. added.

At last, the headline matches the lede

The Ignorance Caucus

Last week Eric Cantor, the House majority leader, gave what his office told us would be a major policy speech.

Oh, you want more?

P.S. I'm going to give PK irony credit for opening his second paragraph with a To be sure ...

Heh. That Krugman.

... while it’s true that the finance guys are still making out like bandits — in part because, as we now know, some of them actually are bandits — ...

(From "Robots and Robber Barons.")

Nobel-Prize winning class clown?

Layout hilarity in a NYT sidebar:

Actual column.

Ryanomics is and always has been a con game, although to be fair, it has become even more of a con since Mr. Ryan joined the ticket.

You should really read the whole thing. It's staggering.

Line of the Day: 2012-08-20

We’re not talking about ideology or even economic analysis here — just a plain misrepresentation of the facts, with an august publication letting itself be used to misinform readers. The Times would require an abject correction if something like that slipped through. Will Newsweek?
    -- Paul Krugman

(h/t: @DiegoUK)

Blockquotes of the Day

Over at Vagabond Scholar, Batocchio has pulled some things you should read. And added some good commentary of his own.

All of it so sad, so true.

Good thing he put up that next post.

Sad that it had to be said, ...

... but good on Paul Krugman for saying it anyway.

Grownups in charge! (Of demonizing Elizabeth Warren)

Paul Krugman encourages you to read a fine piece by Joe Nocera on the woman who may (should, by most non-wingnut accounts) become the first director of the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Basically, she'd be in charge of (1) implementing and enforcing reforms to make sure the banksters couldn't again do what they did leading up to the crash of 2008, and (2) stopping them from doing some of what they've been doing since.

And what does the Party of Fiscal Responsibility™ have to say about this?

To listen to the House Republicans, you’d think the financial crisis of 2008 was like that infamous season of the long-running soap opera “Dallas,” the one that turned out to be a season-long dream. Subprime mortgages? Too-big-to-fail banks? Unregulated derivatives? No problem! With the exception of their bête noire, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the Republicans act as if nothing needs to be done to prevent another crisis. Indeed, they act as if the crisis never happened.

So, naturally, they're starting to groom their portrayal of her as the next America-hatin', MoreEvilThanSatanHimself figure to be flogged. Probably going to be a lot of highly-focused hate coming from the RWNM this summer.

I'd recommend starting with Krugman's post as an introduction. And don't fail to follow the other link he offers, to a post by Simon Johnson. Johnson is a former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund, and he's none too impressed with what he's seeing from some in the White House, particularly Tim Geithner, regarding their lukewarm support for Warren and the need for reform overall.

(pic. source | x-posted)

Lots of horrible news in the headlines, for sure ...

... but at least spare a few moments' thought for our poor put-upon banksters and their brave public servants.

That part about Bank of America's shenanigans in Nevada is just … how do those people sleep at night?

Don't get me started

Prof. K.:

(My suggestion that we reject all applicants claiming to be “passionate” about their plans was rejected, but with obvious reluctance.)

Deja Not Vu All Over Again

The Shrill One:

That Iraq Feeling

I don’t watch cable news, or actually any kind of TV news. But I gather that there’s a virtual blackout on the huge demonstrations in Wisconsin, except on Fox, which portrays them as thuggish and violent.

What that makes me think of is January-February 2003, when anyone watching cable news would have believed that only a few kooks were opposed to the imminent invasion of Iraq. It was quite spooky, realizing that hundreds of thousands of people could march through New York, and by tacit agreement be ignored by news networks whose headquarters were just a few blocks away.

And it’s even more spooky to see it happening all over again.

(previously)

(x-posted)