The magical world of voodoo ‘economists’

The Washington Post ^ | 9/10/11 | Steven Pearlstein

[1010RD]

If you came up with a bumper sticker that pulls together the platform of this year’s crop of Republican presidential candidates, it would have to be:

Repeal the 20th century. Vote GOP.

It’s not just the 21st century they want to turn the clock back on — health-care reform, global warming and the financial regulations passed in the wake of the recent financial crises and accounting scandals.

These folks are actually talking about repealing the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act and the Environmental Protection Agency, created in 1970s.

SNIP

They reject as thoroughly discredited all of Keynesian economics, including the efficacy of fiscal stimulus, preferring the budget-balancing economic policies that turned the 1929 stock market crash into the Great Depression.

They also reject the efficacy of monetary stimulus to fight recession, and give the strong impression they wouldn’t mind abolishing the Federal Reserve and putting the country back on the gold standard.

SNIP

One of them is even talking about repealing the 16th and 17th amendments to the Constitution, allowing for a federal income tax and the direct election of senators — landmarks of the Progressive Era.

SNIP

Not every candidate embraces every one of these kooky ideas. But what’s striking is that when Rick Perry stands up and declares that “Keynesian policy and Keynesian theory is now done,” not one candidate is willing to speak up for the most important economic thinker of the 20th century...

[1010RD]

This article is worth reading as the author lays out the Democrat's economic talking points for 2012. The economy will continue to be the main issue during the entire election.

Refuting his points and understanding their flaws will be job one for conservatives. We've got to undo this bad thinking forever.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

He does not really engage any conservative positions, he merely dismisses them. He then resorts to the old trick of associating liberal positions with science. As if Keynesian economics was equivalent to Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle.

Mr. Pearlstein clearly has no more grasp of economics than he does of physics. He is *cough* an intellectual tourist *cough* showing us the home videos of his Alpine travels and now wishs to regale us with his first hand accounts of the geologic, cultural and political history of Switzerland.

My approach to Mr. Pearlstein is to dismiss, rather than engage him. We do not share the same premises, and regardless of his embrace of “scientific Keynesianism”, it is he, not us, who refuses to learn from or understand experience.

The 20th Century was marked by more jimcrack halfbaked notions and social experiments than any other in the history of man. Repeal socialism, Communism, Marxism, eugenics (Margret Sanger, anyone?), Keynesianism, Freudian quakery, Nazism, lysenkoism, Stalinism, all of them packaged neatly in a box labeled “progressivism”? You bet.

Hitler was an “idealist” and a “progressive”. He was also a socialist, an animal rights advocate, a vegetarian, a teatotaller, an antichristian who espoused a preverse, self-serving form of Christianity, a non-smoker, a drug abuser, a hypochondriac, an avid of follower of unconventional medicine, childishly sentimental, a dilettante and a sexual deviant. He was enthralled by a superficial and superstitious naturalism. He was a technical illiterate fascinated by the fruits of technology he never really understood and upon which he made sweeping generalizations and pronouncements, while loathing and envying its creators. If he were alive today and living in Wisconsin, he’d be on the liberal arts faculty of a third rate community college and a Democratic Party activist.

[1010RD]

Delightful post and I think I've met Hitler's shadows at college. That said we have one point of disagreement: dismissing Mr. Pearlstein and others like him.

We've seen Progressivism, starting with the often overlooked Teddy Roosevelt (the ‘good’ socialist to most conservatives), rise to lofty heights well beyond the true value of its ideas. They've done so through literal mind control - the media and the education establishment. They still control both of those and will into the foreseeable future.

The persistence of bad ideas should scare every conservative. Mr. Perlstein, et al, shouldn't be dismissed, but debunked - thoroughly and often.

[SkyPilot]

I am always amused to read Liberals talking about "Turning back the clock" on things - as if there is some proverbial clock in the sky that denotes "progress."

The only "clock" in the sky is the one towards God's judgment and Armageddon, but they avoid that subject at every turn.

I don't see "progress", but instead the world becoming more and more evil, and times getting increasingly desperate in all areas: economic, social, crime, debt, anger, immorality, and Godlessness.

Liberals are Humanists - they thing man is the measure of all things. They hate God, who is really in charge.

They will have eternity to think about that proverbial "clock" while they are in Hell forever, unless they turn to Christ.

[BfloGuy]

They reject as thoroughly discredited all of Keynesian economics, including the efficacy of fiscal stimulus, preferring the budget-balancing economic policies that turned the 1929 stock market crash into the Great Depression.

How long can liberals continue to lie about Hoover? No one made any attempt to balance the federal budget until 1937. During the first eight years, Hoover followed by Roosevelt, increased federal spending and made the deficits larger.

Eventually, FDR would try to rein in spending, but with a growing GDP, spending actually increased even as the budget was balanced for a short time.

[ProtectOurFreedom]

Good analysis. Yes, he just says "20th Century Progressivism" was good without looking at any of the results that progressives have wrought:

1. an ill-educated electorate voting for the politicians who will give away the most of our public treasury
2. staggering indebtedness for our children
3. a debt death-spiral from which we may simply not recover
4. totally bankrupt entitlement programs
5. rates of illegitimacy that no civilization has ever survived
6. diminishing global power and loss of "Pax Americana"
7. loss of our manufacturing base
8. permanent underclass living off welfare
9. homo "marriage"
10. public schools that are nothing but liberal indoctrination centers that turn out students who despise Western Civilization
11. completely open borders
12. open immigration from third-world hell-holes where people were raised to hate American and are anathema to our freedom
13. multiculturalism that destroys our national identity and balkanizes all of us
14. government unions that are fighting against the very taxpayers who pay their member salaries
15. high minimum wages that have destroyed entry level jobs for the uneducated lower classes
16. open racial warfare by feral black males against other races

Judge progressivism on its century results. If you do that honestly, you must conclude that every one of the 20th Century Progressive programs is a massive failure. How can anybody see a single "progressive" success in the untold mess we have around us today?

Isn't it time for an American Restoration to sweep away a century of failure by the marxists, commies, and progressives?

[wideawake]

There is not much in the way of analysis here.

The issue with Keynesianism is that it works only once. If you have relatively low public debt and relatively low taxes and a worldwide economic crisis arises, you can tax and spend your way back into a stimulated economy.

But unless you use the resulting prosperity to pay down debt and reduce taxes, you will get diminishing returns with each new Keynesian stimulus.

The 20th Century from 1932 to 1982 was the apotheosis of Keynesianism. That's what the Democrats want. The Buchananites want 18th Century mercantilism.

What we need is 21st Century thinking.

[ProtectOurFreedom]

Taxes soared out of control during the depression. That alone was a major cause of the depression. The author is ignorant.

[cake_crumb]

Sounds like he holds all of Obama’s positions. We all know how THOSE are working for us.

[Skepolitic]

“Refuting [the article’s] points and understanding their flaws will be job one for conservatives.”

You’re absolutely correct, and that’s why I found last night’s CNN debate disappointing. The Republican candidates should be in a contest to demonstrate who best expresses a conservative vision that can defeat Obama’s vision of a social welfare state. Instead, the Republicans again act like the stupid party, and allow the MSM to goad them into jabbing each other.

The debate format is really best-suited for Democrat candidates. It’s easy for Democrats to advocate “health care for all”, “a jobs bill to get the country moving again”, or “gay marriage” in slogans and soundbites. It’s much more difficult to distil the argument against such nonsense into a few words.

Even though the debate format makes it difficult to express ideas that address the complexity of the real world, there’s no excuse for Republicans to go on public display with petty squabbling.

[Skepolitic]

Very good, very good indeed though, if he were alive today and living in Wisconsin Hitler would probably be on the fine arts faculty of a third rate community college and a Democratic Party activist.

[outofsalt]

I would, however, abort this author.

[Ronin]

Hitler was an “idealist” and a “progressive”. He was also a socialist, an animal rights advocate, a vegetarian, a teatotaller, an antichristian who espoused a preverse, self-serving form of Christianity, a non-smoker, a drug abuser, a hypochondriac, an avid of follower of unconventional medicine, childishly sentimental, a dilettante and a sexual deviant. He was enthralled by a superficial and superstitious naturalism. He was a technical illiterate fascinated by the fruits of technology he never really understood and upon which he made sweeping generalizations and pronouncements, while loathing and envying its creators. If he were alive today and living in Wisconsin, he’d be on the liberal arts faculty of a third rate community college and a Democratic Party activist.

I'm stealing that. FReepmail me your name so I can give credit where it's due.

[Caipirabob]

DEMOCRATS: BUILDING A BRIDGE TO THE FOURTH REICH

DEMOCRATS: BECAUSE THE TALIBAN ARE A BUNCH OF SWELL GUYS WHEN IT COMES DOWN TO IT

DEMOCRATS: BECAUSE SOVEREIGNTY IS SO 19TH CENTURY

DEMOCRATS: BECAUSE THE COLD WAR WAS FOUGHT AGAINST THE WRONG ENEMY

[ALPAPilot]

They refuse to embrace Darwin’s theory of evolution, which has been widely accepted since the Scopes Trial of the 1920s.

Newton's Laws of Motion were widely accepted since the time an apple fell on his head. It however was repealed by the quantum physics that he fears Republicans will try to repeal.

It is not the Republicans that want to repeal quantum physics, its the young physicist who wants to be the next Einstein who will discover a new model that interprets the physical world more closely.

[Cincinatus]

not one candidate is willing to speak up for the most important economic thinker of the 20th century...

Did Milton Friedman's name not come up?

[Jack Hydrazine]

“In 1930, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, in an effort to alleviate the effects of the ... Anyone? Anyone? ... the Great Depression, passed the ... Anyone? Anyone? The tariff bill? The Hawley-Smoot Tariff Act? Which, anyone? Raised or lowered? ... raised tariffs, in an effort to collect more revenue for the federal government. Did it work? Anyone? Anyone know the effects? It did not work, and the United States sank deeper into the Great Depression. Today we have a similar debate over this. Anyone know what this is? Class? Anyone? Anyone? Anyone seen this before? The Laffer Curve. Anyone know what this says? It says that at this point on the revenue curve, you will get exactly the same amount of revenue as at this point. This is very controversial. Does anyone know what Vice President Bush called this in 1980? Anyone? Something d-o-o economics. ‘Voodoo’ economics.”

[Chickensoup]

I may be wrong but I think Ron Paul comes closest to Milton Friedmans philosophy

[Raycpa]

Satire?

[muir_redwoods]

People went hungry and even starved in this country while FDR’s thugs forced farmers to pour milk into streams, burn crops and kill and bury farm animals. That’s progressive thinking and it’s resultant actions.