Paul Krugman's Rather Odd Love Affair With Gordon Brown

Friday, 12th June 2009

I wouldn't ever dream of debating economics with Paul Krugman*. Politics, however? Well that's a horse of a different colour. The Nobel laureate is, it seems, in Britain and he has this to say:

Weird politics here in London, with Gordon Brown desperately unpopular even (or maybe especially) among those who surely share his general ideological outlook. And yet …
...It’s not far-fetched to imagine that Britain will soon be experiencing at least a modest recovery, even as its neighbors languish.
Yet that possibility doesn’t seem to factor into any of the political discussion.

Even if one grants that is true - and, who knows, perhaps it is! Let's hope so! - it still seems a pretty optimistic view and one that, one can't help but suspect, is coloured by Mr Krugman's own politics. Mr Krugman may approve of Gordon Brown and his policies but he doesn't seem to take any account of the enormous quantity of debt with which Brown has saddled this country, far less with the mistakes Brown made as Chancellor which left this country's position vis a vis the financial crisis, rather worse than it necessarily would have had to be. That is, Mr Krugman seems to think we should give Brown great credit for putting out a fire he poured flames upon in the first place. Life isn't Backdraft even if Mr Krugman thinks it is. Firefighting arsonists are still arsonists.

And, really, I suppose one should apologise on behalf of the British people for our collective failure to appreciate that Mr Krugman is correct and we are wrong and that his numbers matter more than any others and, consequently, we have all been beastly unfair to the poor, visionary, Prime Minister.

But politics isn't about economic indices. Or at least, not solely about them. If it were John Major might have won the 1997 election. But he and his party didn't deserve to just as Brown and his party don't deserve to win the next election. Exhausted parties need to be turfed out of office, regardless of economic indicators and regardless of whether or not one might, in other circumstances, have some synpathy for their default positions or attitude.

Mr Krugman's apparent bafflement is, therefore, itself somewhat baffling. Unless, that is, he really does have little to no clue about politics.

*Mind you, Mr Krugman gave a lecture in - and about - Scotland a few years ago that underwhelmed those present. "Like a bearded Woody Allan with numbers" was one of the more charitable verdicts.

Filed under: Britain (736 more articles) , Brown (180 more articles) , Economics (64 more articles)

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dearieme

June 12th, 2009 9:14am Report this comment

"..wouldn't ever dream of debating economics with Paul Krugman*." It is always wise to avoid debating theology with one of The Elect.

seb

June 12th, 2009 9:30am Report this comment

Exactly. A recovery with Brown in charge would be as disastrous as the 'boom' was with Brown as chancellor. Would we invite a burlgar back into the house to nick the really valuable things you'd hidden from him the first time? Sure.

Stephen Rothbart

June 12th, 2009 10:25am Report this comment

Paul Krugman is in love with Obama and that says it all. How a Nobel prize winner can really believe that two leaders who think that they way to get an over borrowed nation out of a mess is to get them to borrow even more, shows that Krugman's grasp of economics is as flakey as the Nobel Prize awards system that has thrown up some pretty dubious winners recently, such as Al Gore and his flawed science project.

Krugman writes in the International Herald Tribune and is almost unreadable in his bias for all things of the Left.

Brown is only well regarded by Krugman because he represents the Left, and like Obama is a fan of big government.

Josh

June 12th, 2009 11:25am Report this comment

Paul Krugman is a fraud who is known to be a mendacious liar who will distort information to suit his own deluded big government ideology.

Visit the website of the Von Mises Institute and search ''Paul Krugman'' in the search toolbar and there are dozens of articles exposing his mythology of lies. Neil Cavuto, not a trained economist, smacked the bitch down once.

Don't worry about debating economics with the Krug. He is a genius when it comes to international trade and some forms of microeconomic theory, but his knowledge of macroeconomics is flakey at best, and he isn't even a NeoKeynesian. He still follows the doctrine of the original Keynesian theory.

One example of his mendacity was when he wrote an article criticising those who criticised New Deal. He said The Depression was worsened when Hoover tried to balance the budget and spending suffered. This is a lie. Hoover increased spending by 47% during his presidency, a fact not acknowledged by the Krug, but he did try and balance the budget by increasing the top rate of tax to 67%. Krugman tried to make people believe he cut spending.

Krugman uses his position to spout lies because he knows people will believe a Nobel prize winning PHD economist.

TomTom

June 12th, 2009 2:30pm Report this comment

Krugman's limited grasp of British reality is self-evident. I don't recall Krugman warning us about the disastrous regulatory system in the USA and UK when firms like AIG emerged with no regulator at all.

British financial policy consists of interest rates 50bp above New York and lax regulation to pick up New York exiles and anonymous oil trading to boost West End rents and EU forecourt prices.

UK economic policy is rogue and typical of island economies living off hot money and tax deals