Krugman is getting close to the edge

[cthulu2016]

42. That's a punchy bon mot, but not very accurate.

Last edited Sat Jun 2, 2012, 01:33 PM - Edit history (3)

Does Krugman have a history of saying "X will pass the senate," or does he say, "X is correct and should be proposed and fought for."

Adherents of the "Krugman doesn't understand politics" rationalization do not, in fact understand politics.

The utility of proposing what is correct is not limited to whether it will pass the senate. Politics is not only about legislative vote counting. It is also about the development of public support, the steering of public attitudes, the framing of issues and ideas.

Why don't we see similar snark about how Martin Luther King couldn't count to 60? I'm sure he favored a lot of legislation that wasn't going to pass that week.

What the US government did in 2009 guaranteed that the election of 2012 would take place during a struggling economy. That is the stupidest political decision I have ever heard of, so I am willing to give the B of the D and assume that the administration did not realize that they were making a political blunder. They must have believed the economic problem was largely self-repairing in a 3 year time-frame.

If they had KNOWN (which they should have) that what was politically possible in 2009 would lead to a disappointing, under-performing economy then Obama should have been on TV saying just that.

Instead he was saying, we have done just what was needed to get back on track.

When you know that is going to blow up in your face and take willing political ownership of an economy that is sure to stagger down the road anyway is that shrewd politics?

If the head of the CDC said, "Only a national vaccination rate of at least 95% can hope to prevent this new deadly space virus from going epidemic," but we know that a couple of blue dogs in the Senate will not fund anything over 40% coverage do we denounce the head of the CDC as politically naive?

And when the senate passes 40% coverage does the president go on TV to talk about how this will solve the space virus problem?

And when the bodies start piling up, what force is there behind the call to vaccinate 95% of people?

"Whatever dude... you said 40% would fix it. Now you say 95%. You have no credibility here."

And the Republicans would be going, "The president's hare-brained vaccination scheme was tried, and it failed. Vaccination does not work. So our idea of putting leeches on the virus victims is clearly correct."



If Obama had done what was right, proposed and fought for what was right, he would not have gotten what he asked for out of the senate. That's a fact.

But when the economy staggered, as it was sure to do, the predicate would be laid. "See, I told you it wasn't enough. Now do what I wanted in the first place." And if Republicans had already taken over the House by then then he could be running against that.

And consider this alternative... let's say Obama had been chicken little and run around demanding more and predicting doom if more wasn't done and he turned out to be wrong. What's the downside? For him to have been wrong the economy would have had to have recovered on its own. He wouldn't be voted out of office for presiding over an awesome 2012 economy, no matter what he had said in 2009.


The reality is that 1) Obama didn't get the nature of the economic problem, and 2) he didn't want to fight with the blue dogs, knowing they would be needed for HCR.

I admire the hell out of the HCR push, whatever the policy defects. I am sympathetic to Obama's legislative priorites, since he did not get how bad the economy was. But to re-write history and pretend that Obama did understand the economy in 2009 paints Obama as a political moron. And I do not think he is.

Nobody with a political brain would take political ownership of an economic policy that was sure to fail. Obama definately has a good political brain. So he didn't get that it was sure to fail. QED.

So we can all stop pretending that the WH wanted to do the right thing but understood the political realities, unlike their stupid, naieve critics of the time.


Is Obama unable to count to 60? Why is he currently traversing the country proposing a jobs act that cannot pass Congress? Where is the scorn for his political cluelessness in such an un-pragmatic proposal?

Obama is doing what he is doing because he figured out, quite belatedly, that you cannot paint the opposition as obstructionist unless they are obstructing something, and the the president ought to get behind something that would actualy do good vis-a-vis the singular issue of the decade.

Demand what is right. The downside of appearing weak because you didn't get your way in the short-term is nothing compared to the downside of presiding over inadequate policy.

That's politics.