OMG: Krugman is 'anti establishment'?!?!

[c1ue]

I saw this Krugman 'I Love Me' article and just snapped.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/191393

But in his published opinions, and perhaps in his very being, he is anti-establishment.

In case anyone is unclear on what Krugman REALLY was saying re: TARP I...

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/09/28/tarp-draft/

Not a good plan. But sufficiently not-awful, I think, to be above the line; and hopefully the whole thing can be fixed next year.

His full op-ed columns were all about 'we need to suck it up and take it for the good of the nation' and so forth.

Now he's saying TARP II is bad because it is not large enough. Oh really.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/09/op...09krugman.html

Watching the news, you might have thought that the only question was whether the plan was too big, too ambitious.
Yet many economists, myself included, actually argued that the plan was too small and too cautious.

ARGH!

[nero3]

Re: OMG: Krugman is 'anti establishment'?!?!

I saw this Krugman 'I Love Me' article and just snapped.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/191393



In case anyone is unclear on what Krugman REALLY was saying re: TARP I...

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/09/28/tarp-draft/



His full op-ed columns were all about 'we need to suck it up and take it for the good of the nation' and so forth.

Now he's saying TARP II is bad because it is not large enough. Oh really.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/09/op...09krugman.html

[/size][/b]




ARGH!

I like krugman. He seems to have a good heart. He knows it's better with higher inflation and lower unemployment, than lower inflation and higher unemployment. He would had been a much better choice than Geithner as treasury secretary. With Krugman the banks would had been nationalized, and the deficit would had been much larger. I have no sympathy for the hard money approach that would cause the service economy to totally collapse, cause the music to stop playing and virtually guarantee an uncontrolled decline in the dollar . You can't pretend to still have something, that never really existed. It what you had never was real, you can't fight the change. That's just silly, the best thing is to paper over as hard as possible. That is exactly what is needed. I really think he is pretty unpractical though. It's not more than 10 months ago he talked about peak oil, stagflation, the seventies, and then later last year he went back to his japan scenario.

One thing, I just reflect over is the lag it takes before we get the US house prices. Had this been in my country, we would had gotten the numbers for march, tomorrow!

Why on earth are we still talking about the January numbers when this is the 1 of April tomorrow?


I think that really is a symbol of the terrible shape the US is in on most levels.

[cjppjc]

Re: OMG: Krugman is 'anti establishment'?!?!

the best thing is to paper over as hard as possible. That is exactly what is needed.

Well, we'll see how it's works out. You know if you have pain eventually you have to go see a doctor. The hard money crowd is the bill that you get.

[we_are_toast]

Re: OMG: Krugman is 'anti establishment'?!?!

Now he's saying TARP II is bad because it is not large enough. Oh really.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/09/op...09krugman.html

[/size][/b]




ARGH!

I think you are mistaken as to what Krugman is referring to. He is referring to the stimulus plan, not the TARP. He has been very consistent about his Keynesian approach of fiscal stimulus.

I read Krugman every day and don't always agree with him, but his heart and his head are in the right place. He backs up his arguments with data and his experience. I've seen him reverse a stance when the conditions change or when he is shown to be wrong. He has taken a lot of heat for opposing the bank bailouts. I'll continue to listen to what he has to say, and listen very closely.

[nero3]

Re: OMG: Krugman is 'anti establishment'?!?!

Well, we'll see how it's works out. You know if you have pain eventually you have to go see a doctor. The hard money crowd is the bill that you get.

The point is that when you have a system like now, you can't suddenly go "hard", at the worst time ever. That's what you do after a period of high inflation. This is the time to inflate the debts away. If you wanted hard money, it should had been done in 1982, with strict limitations on credit, so we never got this bubble. Nobody can justify 20-30 % unemployment, to go hard now, unless they are insane that is. When the bubble is a fact, and it's collapsing, that's when you don't want hard money.

[cjppjc]

Re: OMG: Krugman is 'anti establishment'?!?!

The point is that when you have a system like now, you can't suddenly go "hard", at the worst time ever. That's what you do after a period of high inflation. This is the time to inflate the debts away. If you wanted hard money, it should had been done in 1982, with strict limitations on credit, so we never got this bubble. Nobody can justify 20-30 % unemployment, to go hard now, unless they are insane that is. When the bubble is a fact, and it's collapsing, that's when you don't want hard money.

I understand where you are comming from. I might even agree with you. It just seems to me the bill gets paid sooner or later. I used to take Tums and Mylanta, until the pain wouldn't go away.

[metalman]

Re: OMG: Krugman is 'anti establishment'?!?!

The point is that when you have a system like now, you can't suddenly go "hard", at the worst time ever. That's what you do after a period of high inflation. This is the time to inflate the debts away. If you wanted hard money, it should had been done in 1982, with strict limitations on credit, so we never got this bubble. Nobody can justify 20-30 % unemployment, to go hard now, unless they are insane that is. When the bubble is a fact, and it's collapsing, that's when you don't want hard money.

100% correct. inflation will 'cure' the debt, then the inflation gets brought back under control by world currencies pegging to either a basket of commodities or to gold... thefouthcurrency.

[Supercilious]

Re: OMG: Krugman is 'anti establishment'?!?!

I saw this Krugman 'I Love Me' article and just snapped.


His full op-ed columns were all about 'we need to suck it up and take it for the good of the nation' and so forth.

Now he's saying TARP II is bad because it is not large enough. Oh really.

Yeah, it's absolutely hilarious how a lot of suckups try to present themselves as anti-establishment. What's next? Paulson trying to suggest he is in fact a follower of the Austrian School? :rolleyes:

[gasull]

Re: OMG: Krugman is 'anti establishment'?!?!

100% correct. inflation will 'cure' the debt, then the inflation gets brought back under control by world currencies pegging to either a basket of commodities or to gold... thefouthcurrency.

Metalman, would you mind to explain this further? How will inflation 'cure' the debt?

If the Fed inflates too much, don't we risk the collapse of the dollar?

Wouldn't it be better if the banks that need to go bankrupt go bankrupt, as Jim Rogers and Joseph Stiglitz say?

Or wouldn't it be better if the debt is negotiated to the level debtors can pay, as Michael Hudson say?

Isn't inflation a way of getting less pain now in exchange of a larger and longer pain the future?

[medved]

Re: OMG: Krugman is 'anti establishment'?!?!

Yeah, it's absolutely hilarious how a lot of suckups try to present themselves as anti-establishment. What's next? Paulson trying to suggest he is in fact a follower of the Austrian School? :rolleyes:

Krugman is just a partisan (liberal) hack. Obviously, he was anti-establishment when GW was in office. Now he is the establishment.

http://optionarmageddon.ml-implode.c...at-your-words/

IMHO, Doug Noland really presents some thoughtful analysis of the credit bubble disaster without reverting to partisan propaganda, and he was doing it as early as 2003.

http://www.prudentbear.com/index.php...ulletinarchive

[nathanhulick]

Re: OMG: Krugman is 'anti establishment'?!?!

Reading this thread, it seems like everyone is forgetting the basic concept that wealth is not created by printing money, or not printing money, or hard money, or fiat, or anything to do with money at all.

A country becomes wealthy by producing more than it consumes, just as an individual becomes wealthy by producing more than he consumes.

Money is simply a medium of exchange and a store of value. Nothing more.

Manipulating the value of money does not make a country more wealthy or less wealthy any more than manipulating the number of inches in a foot makes me taller or shorter.

[gasull]

Re: OMG: Krugman is 'anti establishment'?!?!

the basic concept that wealth is not created by printing money, or not printing money, or hard money, or fiat, or anything to do with money at all.

A country becomes wealthy by producing more than it consumes, just as an individual becomes wealthy by producing more than he consumes.

Money is simply a medium of exchange and a store of value. Nothing more.

Thanks! I was starting to think that common sense had left iTulip.

[Guest]

Re: OMG: Krugman is 'anti establishment'?!?!

Excellent, hard headed realist's comment Nero3.

The point is that when you have a system like now, you can't suddenly go "hard", at the worst time ever. That's what you do after a period of high inflation. This is the time to inflate the debts away. If you wanted hard money, it should had been done in 1982, with strict limitations on credit, so we never got this bubble. Nobody can justify 20-30 % unemployment, to go hard now, unless they are insane that is. When the bubble is a fact, and it's collapsing, that's when you don't want hard money.

[nero3]

Re: OMG: Krugman is 'anti establishment'?!?!

Reading this thread, it seems like everyone is forgetting the basic concept that wealth is not created by printing money, or not printing money, or hard money, or fiat, or anything to do with money at all.

A country becomes wealthy by producing more than it consumes, just as an individual becomes wealthy by producing more than he consumes.

Money is simply a medium of exchange and a store of value. Nothing more.

Manipulating the value of money does not make a country more wealthy or less wealthy any more than manipulating the number of inches in a foot makes me taller or shorter.

I suspect that the full liquidation route, where everything is left to it's own devices, will ensure that unemployment reach the 20-30 % range, and the dollar collapse as a result of a lack in trust in the middle of this collapse. That's why I think printing and stimulation, might be better for the dollar, even it sounds as a contradiction. I sometimes get the impression from Peter Schiff, that it's possible to keep the inflated living standards from the credit era, had there only been a gold standard. However I doubt it. I like the idea of a gold standard, but I don't think that system would buy more food, or avoid the collapse in living standards that have to come as the US rebuild it's industrial base and starts to take on China.

[Down Under]

Re: OMG: Krugman is 'anti establishment'?!?!

Money is simply a medium of exchange and a store of value. Nothing more.

Is the USD a store of value? GBP? AUD? Take your pick...