Left wing God of Keynesianism, Paul Krugman, has said more crazy things than Michelle Bachmann, Sarah Palin and Ron Paul combined, yet he remains the go-t0 guy for the mainstream media on everything ecconomics.
Which is proof that you can get away with a lot of wackiness after you win a Nobel Prize. Here’s the latest from Michelle Malkin (emphasis is hers):
PAUL KRUGMAN, NEW YORK TIMES: Think about World War II, right? That was actually negative social product spending, and yet it brought us out.
I mean, probably because you want to put these things together, if we say, “Look, we could use some inflation.” Ken and I are both saying that, which is, of course, anathema to a lot of people in Washington but is, in fact, what the basic logic says.
It’s very hard to get inflation in a depressed economy. But if you had a program of government spending plus an expansionary policy by the Fed, you could get that. So, if you think about using all of these things together, you could accomplish, you know, a great deal.
If we discovered that, you know, space aliens were planning to attack and we needed a massive buildup to counter the space alien threat and really inflation and budget deficits took secondary place to that, this slump would be over in 18 months. And then if we discovered, oops, we made a mistake, there aren’t any aliens, we’d be better off.
Now, imagine the snickering ridicule from the left if anyone on the right ever said anything this absurd.
Kruggy rarely disappoints.
Related Posts:
- The Closing of the Krugman Mind
- Killing the Messenger by Paul Krugman and the Democrats
- Paul Krugman: Anti-Taxers Have Destroyed America’s Infrastructure
- Oops, Can I have a Mulligan?
3 responses so far ↓
1 Will the Real Paul Krugman Please Stand Up // Aug 25, 2011 at 8:16 am
[...] would be good for the economy if the country were invaded by space aliens; [...]
2 Ralph Musgrave // Sep 14, 2011 at 4:05 am
As a Keynsian, I am delighted with the moronic response from the political right to Krugman’s “alien” point. Krugman here is simply making the same point that Keynes made namely that you can get an increase in GDP and employment even if the form of spending that brings that increase is pointless. Keynes gave as an example having people dig holes in the ground and fill them up all day long.
Having given that example, Keynes then explained at length (for the benefit of the stupid and the humorless) that he was not seriously in favour of piontless hole digging. That is, he was simply giving a colourful illustration of a technical point.
Krugman’s big mistake when spelling out his alien point was that he didn’t explain (for the benefit of the stupid and the humourless) that he was not being serious.
In fact the two Ks would have been better off not using colourful or humorous illustrations. If your audience is so dumb that after telling them a joke you have to explain that you’ve just told a joke, there is not much point in telling the joke.
3 Peter // Sep 14, 2011 at 9:58 am
Ralph,
Why do moronic responses delight you?
Intelligent responses delight me, which is why I got depressed when I read your comment.
By the way, Krugman should leave the humor to me.