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Anti-Krugman 1

Paul Krugman brought some great analysis of economics, the dismal science, to the New York Times Op-Ed page, but has consistently beat the drum in recent years for being dismal about every Bush decision and inaction. I am going to start an anti-Krugman column to take apart each criticism. These antibodies might allow us to have a debate that would allow both less reactive talking points for Democrats and more constructive criticism for the Administration.

The Krugman column is behind the Times Select wall. The cheapest way to pierce this wall is to order home delivery of the Times and go on regular three-month vacations.

Today's Krugman column has the title "King of Pain".

Starting with the ending:

The fact is that for all his talk of being a “war president,” Mr. Bush has been conspicuously unwilling to ask Americans to make sacrifices on behalf of the cause — even when, in the days after 9/11, the nation longed to be called to a higher purpose. His admirers looked at him and thought they saw Winston Churchill. But instead of offering us blood, toil, tears and sweat, he told us to go shopping and promised tax cuts.
Only now, five years after 9/11, has Mr. Bush finally found some things he wants us to sacrifice. And those things turn out to be our principles and our self-respect.

World War 2 saw US government spending soar to nearly 40% of GDP and I'm guessing higher for Churchill's UK. This was from 3% in 1925. That kind of increase in Government spending was good to hoist us out of the depression by our own bootstraps after Hoover mucked up monetary policy and banking and securities law. It is hugely inflationary once the economy can demand the goods that it produces as optimism returns. Thus Churchill requested that people make sacrifices to avoid crippling inflation. Bush on the other hand is spending about $400-$500 billion on Iraq and far less on the War on Terror before the Iraq invasion. That amounts to 3-4% of GDP. So much for monetary and goods sacrifice. At the time we were worried about deflation. The backdrop here was a global slump in Japan and Europe. They were experiencing a bigger demographic oldster overhang and lower birth and immigration rates than the US making our demographic bulge look positively peachy in comparison. GDP doesn't carry over. If an individual saves, great. If the whole country saves and does not invest and spend, nothing gets built for the savers to use later and the production is wasted. So all of our catchup savers for retirement left us with people willing to work extra without other people who wanted to spend extra. Exports were out. Thus a fiscal stimulus was called for in retrospect. (My opinion is Bush was lucky with the timing of his tax cut and prescription drug benefit.) You need not know this about the economy. Krugman knows this well and is distorting it on purpose to make the Bush tax cut and increased deficit and lack of economic sacrifice seem suboptimal in retrospect. A Democrat might have chosen subsidizing national health care instead, but to do neither would have resulted in unutilized capacity.

As for tears, World War 2 saw 400,000 deaths of US servicemen (about 2.5% or 1 in 40 of the 16 million). Iraq saw 3,000 deaths (out of about 1 million active duty or 1 in 300 of active duty. But also as percent of US population it fell from 0.3% to 0.001%. So tears are down also.

How about sweat? Keep an 1/2 a tank of gas in your car and buy some duct tape? Filling up your car twice as often which was recommended by Ridge at Homeland Security would be an extra 15 minutes a week which would reduce GDP by about 0.6%. Inform on your friends? Sweat the telephone and library data until it confesses? In retrospect, that didn't help us much.

The technique Krugman is using here is a multiple untruth. By stating an incorrect premise, Krugman makes it very difficult to sort out what the incorrect nature of the statement is and the correction must be quite lengthy to refute the false implication and will perforce be neither glib nor intuitive.

Krugman uses this to paint an awful president doing awful management of the war on terror. Specifically, it is trying to do torture to expand Presidential power.

Let’s be clear what we’re talking about here. According to an ABC News report from last fall, procedures used by C.I.A. interrogators have included forcing prisoners to “stand, handcuffed and with their feet shackled to an eye bolt in the floor for more than 40 hours”; the “cold cell,” in which prisoners are forced “to stand naked in a cell kept near 50 degrees,” while being doused with cold water; and, of course, water boarding, in which “the prisoner is bound to an inclined board, feet raised and head slightly below the feet,” then “cellophane is wrapped over the prisoner’s face and water is poured over him,” inducing “a terrifying fear of drowning.”

First, Congress can outlaw this. Second, the Geneva Conventions outlaws all interrogation of prisoners, not just aggressive interrogation. Remember name, rank and serial number from old TV programs? Third, terrorists do not abide the Geneva Conventions and assault civilians on purpose, kill captured soldiers and mutilate them, don't wear insignia and don't provide all the other civilized niceties. Can we all agree that soldiers that break the laws of war should get the least common denominator between prisoners of war and common criminals? That is, they can't be released until the "war" is over and they can be questioned. The Supreme Court does not disagree with this. The rest is up to Congress.

Personally, I think it is a poor political strategy to lock up enemy combatants and throw away the key. It will not be so easy to declare a war on terror over. But that puts me in a much much smaller minority than Krugman and Bush are appealing to with their rhetoric.

Back to Krugman. He clearly thinks simulated drowning is cruel and unusual punishment. I agree with him, but that is debatable. I agree with him about the quality of the data recovered being low. But we as a polity demanded action against terrorism. This is action and the Administration argues that we have prevented more terrorism. Personally, I think that terrorism is not a big threat to life, liberty or property in this country and with zero major terrorist atrocities in the US since 2001, it's hard to prove the Administration did anything with it's policies pro or con. Pursuit of happiness demanded a big dose of revenge after 9/11/1. Consider these prisoners collateral damage. If so, the collateral damage in the war on terror has been quite low. This does not rise to the rights losses at Manzanar for the Japanese Americans. We are addressing it before the war has even ended.

Credit Bush with poor spin in this area and overly aggressive about Presidential power, deaf to international criticism. Credit Krugman with criticizing the spin and mishandling of the details to the exclusion of the basic points which there would be strong bi-partisan agreement for. The basic points can be spun almost as badly as the Bush policy to the international community. Presidential power is checked. Krugman offers no alternative. (The vacuum gets filled by being an indignant Bush hater giving anti-terrorists little ability to do anything other than vote out realists like Leiberman because they haven't done enough and they have done too much already).

The rhetorical techniques are to use the specific to imply an overarching evil generalization. Krugman is quite effective and will be difficult to neutralize.

Posted by Sam Dinkin at September 18, 2006 08:27 AM

Comments

I am going to start an anti-Krugman column to take apart each criticism.

Good. If you try to systematically respond to a fair cross-section of even part of the New York Times, in this case one op-ed columnist, then you are showing a great deal more courage than most of this side of the blogosphere. Because most bloggers on this side of it casually bash the Times about 20 times as often as they actually address anything that it has to say. Then when they do address it, they just recycle some prepackaged accusations and nit-picking. You are actually trying to think for yourself, which is a big improvement.

On the other hand, you're not as convincing as Krugman.

At the time we were worried about deflation.

"At the time?" Bush is still president. The biggest long-term problem, according to most economists, is the current-account deficit. The fact that the war on Islamic terrorism is 100% borrowed doesn't help anything.

Rand Simberg has repeatedly emphasized that we are engaged in something that he likes to call a "world war". Krugman's point is that this is a very peculiar kind of "world war" that is based on pampering taxpayers. Which is to say that it isn't being fought as a "world war" at all, but rather as a financially unsustainable occupation of one country. (Yes, there is also Afghanistan, but in the context of resource allocation, it's just a side show.)

He clearly thinks simulated drowning is cruel and unusual punishment.

No, he thinks that it's torture. As everyone in the country would if it were done to an American citizen. It certainly isn't "punishment", because it is inflicted on detainees who haven't been convicted, tried, or charged with any specific crime in any legal code or judicial system. They do it to extract information.

Congress can outlaw this.

They don't need to, because it's already illegal. Bush and the Republican leadership are trying to take Congress in the opposite direction. They are trying to legalize the torture of abducted foreigners. Thankfully, some Republicans still have some human decency.

But we as a polity demanded action against terrorism.

That's fine; unfortunately, when American soldiers or agents torture foreigners, it's action in favor of terrorism.

Krugman is quite effective and will be difficult to neutralize.

That's true. But don't worry, his influence is mostly limited to the 20% of the public that reads the news (on the Internet or on paper) instead of watching it on television.

Posted by Mike Johnson at September 18, 2006 09:13 AM

Mike: I'm not one of the economists who thinks the trade deficit is unsustainable. See this. In any case, taking money from the rich and giving it to the middle class as national health insurance (as advocated by Krugman) doesn't help with the trade deficit if there is full substitution. (E.g., health care shouldered by the Government would postpone wage cuts at the big 3 auto makers.) and to the extent it does, it just makes us poorer without making anyone else richer.

What would you have us do with our borrowing authority? Build more houses? Krugman says nope. Subsidize medical care? Krugman says yep. Just not use it and let it go to waste? Krugman is being disengenuous when he calls it peculiar to not ask for sacrifice. He knows it's unnecessary and counterproductive. I'd spend it on space colonization and Krugman would spend it on medical care. Bush spends it on tax cuts and Iraq. We all would spend it.

Torture is outlawed as cruel and unusual punishment in the Constitution among other spots. But what is it? What law can you point to that defines what either is? Saying it's illegal begs the question of what "it" is.

"As everyone would agree if it was done to an American citizen"

This is unsettled in more than one sense. Can an enemy combatant be American? A dirty bomber? Is ill-treatment of prisoners illegal torture? Michael Jackson has some pretty horrific stories. Do you disapprove of his treatment if the stories he told of his detention were true? Walt Anderson was ill-treated as America's number one American Citizen tax cheat. Prison rape is commonplace in the American icon in such movies as the Shawshank Redemption. We may talk a good game in the terrorism context when it comes to torture, but prisoner's rights are not well protected for American citizens.

"You are trying to think for yourself"

The backhanded compliment is one of Krugman's great weapons.

"You are not as convincing as Krugman"

And Krugman is not as convincing as Bush. With Krugman so smart, that seems unfair. That doesn't stop him.

Ad hohuminem: A personal attack so lacking in interest as to cause mental weariness.

Posted by Sam Dinkin at September 18, 2006 10:18 AM

We were in a world war during the Cold War, too. Not all world wars look alike.

Posted by Rand Simberg at September 18, 2006 10:55 AM

Sam,

Have you seen the Krugman Truth Squad posts at John Weidner's site "Random Jottings"?

http://home.pacbell.net/weidners/jottings2/krugman_index.htm

The index ends in 2003, but the posts continued until very recently. Perhaps a collaboration is in order?

Mike

Posted by Michael Kent at September 18, 2006 10:55 AM

Taking money from the rich and giving it to the middle class as national health insurance (as advocated by Krugman)

This is a distortion of Krugman's position. He clearly stated that an expansion of Medicare should be financed by the payroll tax, which is taking money from the middle class and giving it to the middle class. This is also far off from the present topic, which is the nature of the war on Islamic terrorism.

What would you have us do with our borrowing authority?

Me personally? I don't know, but I certainly wouldn't have the federal government soak up half of it. Bush, for his part, has gone back to his old line that "it's your money". It takes chutzpah to new heights to describe borrowing authority as "your money".

Just not use it and let it go to waste?

The idea that world credit would "go to waste" if the American federal government didn't use it up is a crock.

Torture is outlawed as cruel and unusual punishment in the Constitution among other spots. But what is it? What law can you point to that defines what either is?

No one with any real authority in America would dispute that mock drowning is torture if an American citizen were subjected to it. If you want to be legalese about it, it's not only an out of bounds as a criminal sentence, it's aggravated assault. Nobody would dispute that it's torture, and a violent felony, even if they did it to a foreigner convicted of murder. The only time that it's effectively legal, at least for the time being, is when American agents do it in the name of the war on terrorism.

Nor does the Bush Administration stop at mock execution. Manadel al-Jamadi was tortured to death by a CIA interrogator at Abu Ghraib. Even though photographs of his corpse appeared on national American television, that agent has not been prosecuted. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manadel_al-Jamadi .

We may talk a good game in the terrorism context when it comes to torture,

But we don't play one.

but prisoner's rights are not well protected for American citizens.

Rape is a big problem in American prisons, but at least no one wants to legalize it. The two issues are related. What is legalized in one context will be quietly condoned in another. Charles Graner was a prison guard in the United States before he got in trouble at Abu Ghraib. (He was photographed with al-Jamadi, but he wasn't the one who killed him.)

The backhanded compliment is one of Krugman's great weapons.

I am not Paul Krugman, and when I said that you think for yourself, there was nothing backhanded about it. If you take the trouble to respond to Krugman column by column, then you may be right or wrong, but you aren't cowardly. (Well, it depends on how you respond, but so far it's been fine.)

Posted by Mike Johnson at September 18, 2006 11:10 AM

Actually, Donald Luskin has been keeping tabs on Krugman for years, to the point that Krugman has hilariously accused him of stalking him.

Posted by Rand Simberg at September 18, 2006 11:23 AM

We were in a world war during the Cold War, too. Not all world wars look alike.

For sure, they all look different. The salient property of this one is that it requires zero material sacrifice from most Americans. As Krugman said, all that we have to give up is our self-respect. (And some of our borrowing authority.)

Posted by Mike Johnson at September 18, 2006 11:26 AM

The salient property of this one is that it requires zero material sacrifice from most Americans.

Unless you count those who already sacrificed, five years ago.

Posted by McGehee at September 18, 2006 11:42 AM

Second, the Geneva Conventions outlaws all interrogation of prisoners, not just aggressive interrogation. Remember name, rank and serial number from old TV programs?

This claim is false. The Geneva Conventions do not outlaw all interrogation of prisoners, only aggressive interrogation.

Name, rank, and serial number is what the prisoner must provide to his captors, it is not the limit of what the captors may seek.

Posted by MattJ at September 18, 2006 11:47 AM

Unless you count those who already sacrificed, five years ago.

Sure, but they don't vote.

Posted by Mike Johnson at September 18, 2006 11:47 AM

Mike: "The idea that world credit would go to waste if America didn't use it is a crock."

If we don't use our borrowing authority at the risk free rate, others will attempt to borrow who are less creditworthy such as state and local government, businesses, etc. Banks and individuals would lend less money to these entities than they are lending to the Federal Government at higher rates of interest than the Government gets. Total spending and total GDP would shrink. The production wouldn't carry over--it would just be deadweight social loss. Ever read Keynes, Mike? Big on crocks apparently. And Chutzpah. Again, this is a tangent. Krugman advocates spending on medical care not reducing borrowing.

"I said that you think for yourself"

That would just be a compliment vs. "You are actually trying to think for yourself". I let the new one stand. Tanks!

"[Krugman] states that medicare expansion should be financed by a payroll tax"

Repealing the tax cut would go to something. Federal spending would go up from 2.4T/year and private spending would be less than if the tax cut had not been repealed.

"Name, rank and serial number are all they are required to provide--this claim is false."

I'm for universal human rights giving even enemy soldiers that break the Geneva the right to a lawyer, the right to remain silent, habeus corpus, the right to parole if they promise not to continue to engage in hostilities for the low level cogs that haven't committed war crimes, etc. But Miranda rights don't really apply to unlawful enemy combatants yet. I think we both agree that questioning beyond name, rank and serial number should occur and there is a broad majority of both parties that think it should not include reading of the right to remain silent and have a lawyer. Any further disagreement seems moot. Even if Miranda did apply, we are not trying to get self-incriminating evidence, we are trying to get actionable intelligence so there would be no inherent need for the evidence to be used in a court of law.

Posted by Sam Dinkin at September 18, 2006 12:28 PM

Most of thse captives aren't technically entitled to Genevia Protection anyway. There are strict definitions as to what a combantant must meet in order to be entitled to those protections.

That we give it at all is a courtesy. Legally, we could simply shoot them dead on the spot as they are not in a legally (by the GC)acceptable uniform.

Posted by Mike Puckett at September 18, 2006 01:07 PM

If we don't use our borrowing authority at the risk free rate, others will attempt to borrow who are less creditworthy such as state and local government, businesses, etc.

Here again, the strange royal "we" as if the United States had a command economy. Just because there are extra money-lenders in the world, that does not mean that the American federal government has to Do Something to get rid of the unwanted credit. It's supposed to be a war on terrorism, not a war on credit. It is true that the Chinese government is extending world credit for bad reasons, but that does not mean that the US has to out-stupid them.

Keynes was talking about something significantly different. What Keynes said is that if the country is in a recession because consumers are not spending enough, then the government should spend now, but reel it back in later, in order to damp the economic cycle. Current fiscal policy is negative Keynesian. We are in an economy that they call "booming" — a more reasonable word would be "expanding" — but they are burning up credit as if it were a recession. They do it for political reasons, one of them being to have a comfortable little "world war" that the taxpayers won't much notice.

Finally, I'm sure that Keynes would have been disgusted by the chutzpah of describing borrowing authority as "your money", whether or not the borrowing was Keynesian.

Repealing the tax cut would go to something.

It would go to balance the budget.

We are not trying to get self-incriminating evidence, we are trying to get actionable intelligence so there would be no inherent need for the evidence to be used in a court of law.

Yet again, the strange royal "we", this time in an attempt to attach a rational objective to government crimes. It's not just that torture is a felony under American law. (Note to Mike Puckett: so is execution without trial.) Torture also destroys actionable intelligence instead of gaining it. News of torture is also a form of crack cocaine for terrorists. (As the Bush Administration unwittingly confirms, when they describe revelations of torture as a betrayal of national security.)

Posted by Mike Johnson at September 18, 2006 01:37 PM

One missing comment concerning creditworthiness: The only reason that the US government is more creditworthy than other American institutions is that the Federal Reserve is a financial platform for everyone else. Excessive federal borrowing is a bad idea because it insidiously degrades the creditworthiness of the entire economy. Unless consumers spend too little (which they don't right now), borrowing should be left to the free market.

And borrowing to make a "world war", or any war, financially painless is a strategic error as well as a financial one. Yes, they did borrow heavily during World War II, but not to the point of casting the whole war offshore.

Posted by Mike Johnson at September 18, 2006 01:51 PM

Mike: The US Fed went to the extraordinary point of cancelling debt auctions before the tax cuts throwing the 30-year benchmark t-bill out. If the Chinese who give us stuff and all the people we buy oil from want t-bills that seems like a pretty good trade to me. I contend the tax cut was a lucky Keynesian stimulus. You contend it wasn't. We got non-inflationary above trend growth. I contend this was due to the lucky tax cut. You contend? Seems to me if it was not a Keynesian stimulus we would have had high inflation for the last five years and growth no higher than trend. You appear to think that if every country ran a budget surplus like the oil sellers the world would be better off. Nope. There would be a massive depression from underutilized capacity. All savers and no borrowers makes jack.

As for the advanced argument that the seignorage on the T-bills is hundreds of billions a year in free money that we could either spend or let go to waste, who should it belong to if not the citizens? We produce green stuff that people want. Your mind will boggle. If we mined it out of the ground and burned it you would probably understand it better.

"It would go to balance the budget"

The old saw that the debt is a burden that will hobble our kids is silly. For generations, kids have earned twice as much per capita as their parents over a lifetime (it doesn't seem that way because the parents are always a generation older). Leaving them a debt of a few years of GDP and more roads, more houses and more human capital is a very good trade for them. They can use their riches to restore the environment far more than we ever degraded it. E.g., Gates solving Malaria personally.

As for the war in Iraq, some would view it like the French helping us get out from under the yoke of the English. Krugman's readers wouldn't.

Again, we can all agree for the purpose of argument that Krugman would have spent it on medical services. This would have been quite nice for some different people than who got a tax cut. Mostly doctors and would-be patients. There still wouldn't have been sacrifice. The original charge of Krugman's petty disengunity regarding the counterintuitive war without sacrifice stands. Mike, you are really a great student of Krugman-style misdirection and multiple untruth. I can tell this anti-Krugman column is going to be a serious challenge every week.

Posted by Sam Dinkin at September 18, 2006 04:16 PM

I contend the tax cut was a lucky Keynesian stimulus. You contend it wasn't.

You keep switching from present tense to past tense and then stray from what I or anyone else has claimed. I don't content that the tax cut wasn't Keynesian. It is true that it wasn't motivated as Keynesian, but it turned out to be Keynesian during a period of recession. But the tax cut is still with us (in the sense that the federal government has a structural deficit) and it certainly isn't Keynesian now. It's exactly what Keynes would haved warned against: borrowing in a time of plenty. You say that everything that Treasury can borrow is the rightful due of the White House and the American taxpayer. Okay, that may be standard Bushonomics, but it certainly isn't Keynesian.

As for the war in Iraq, some would view it like the French helping us get out from under the yoke of the English.

Some would view it like the defeat of the Spanish Armada, but that would be an equally stale historical analogy. Although your analogy does have some merit, in that the French state did in fact go bankrupt from overspending, haphazard taxation, and sheer incompetence and arrogance. The American Revolution did not help the French budget, nor did it serve the interests of the head of state.

Again, we can all agree for the purpose of argument that Krugman would have spent it on medical services.

Absolutely not. Whether you think that deficit spending is utopia or the apocalypse, or anything in between, Krugman has never advocated it for the purpose of medical services. He has consistently said that retirement and medical programs should have balanced funding.

As for the war in Iraq, what is actually going to happen is very simple. By 2009, the Bush Administration will have borrowed more than a half-trillion dollars only to lose a war that it started. The defenders of the war in Iraq are going to accept defeat by one of two arguments. They will either say that Iraq is only an itty bitty skirmish in a much larger war. (Never mind that the Bush Administration isn't fighting any such much larger war.) Or they will claim that it was going swell until Democrats or RINOs, or maybe "the media", snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. Defeat is completely unavoidable, for one reason because they have tried to squeeze a grandiose victory into the credit margin all along.

Posted by Mike Johnson at September 18, 2006 05:59 PM

"The tax cut is still with us."

but the quote is about not having been asked for sacrifice to date. Apparently we agree that a fiscal stimulus was called for, not sacrifice even if we disagree on what it was spent on. That locks in the disengenuity of the complaint that there hasn't been a call for sacrifice.

"Krugman has never advocated [using increased revenue from rolling back the tax cut] for the purpose of medical services."

If the US rolls back the tax cut from charging me $0.3645 to take home my last $0.6355 or 57.4% if we count it like sales tax to charging me $0.4105 to take home my last $0.5895 or 69.6%, then assuming I continue to work just as hard, the Government will have more money. It will spend other money on the medical care. We have to carefully track those serial numbers on George because we can't have money just going into the Federal fisc and coming out willy nilly. Excuse me. I apologize deeply for the misunderstanding.

The tax cut money will just be used to pay down the debt. To me, this is now two bad policies. A) Spending less when we have an extremely productive economy with 50%+ of the economy pessimistic and the baby boomers actively saving for retirement, business and consumers spooked by gas prices at $50/fill up vs. $130/fill up in Europe and confidence weighed down by perennial terror alerts and news from Iraq, a world awash in production capacity and commodities revenue with a workforce that is rapidly aging. And B) implementing a medicare expansion instead of a space colonization policy.

Posted by Sam Dinkin at September 18, 2006 06:43 PM

>>As for the war in Iraq, some would view it like the French helping us get out from under the yoke of the English.

>Some would view it like the defeat of the Spanish Armada, but that would be an equally stale historical analogy. Although your analogy does have some merit, in that the French state did in fact go bankrupt from overspending, haphazard taxation, and sheer incompetence and arrogance. The American Revolution did not help the French budget, nor did it serve the interests of the head of state.

Mike, what I meant by my analogy (which I think you are misinterpreting on purpose to be witty) is that America was being ruled by a tyrant named George back before 1776 and now it is within a few hanging chads and butterfly ballots of being a democractic republic. I assert that it is a matter of taste to spend money on Iraq and that much good has been accomplished in Iraq along with all the ill. It is a matter of personal opinion whether the ill outweighs the good going backward and forward. Personally, I would have preferred Bush colonize the Moon to Iraq, but I didn't have the votes.

Posted by Sam Dinkin at September 18, 2006 07:01 PM

I assert that it is a matter of taste to spend money on Iraq and that much good has been accomplished in Iraq along with all the ill.

I think that the example of Vladimir Putin ought to teach people that it is not enough to ask for democracy in other countries; you should also look at least a little bit at who wins the elections. Now in Iraq, the elections were won by bands of murderous Shiite theocrats historically rooted in international terrorism. That's the negative, and it's what I meant by the phrase "lose a war". On the positive side, the US has refurbished some schools and similar.

Posted by Mike Johnson at September 18, 2006 07:43 PM

"Name, rank and serial number are all they are required to provide--this claim is false."

You've mixed what I said with what you've said and put quote marks around it. Unless you're trying to respond that my claim is false. The fact is, what you said originally with respect to this point was flatly wrong.

I think we both agree that questioning beyond name, rank and serial number should occur and there is a broad majority of both parties that think it should not include reading of the right to remain silent and have a lawyer. Any further disagreement seems moot.

It seems to me that any further disagreement goes to the heart of the debate that our nation is having.

Posted by MattJ at September 18, 2006 08:24 PM

Quote from Mike Johnson: "what is actually going to happen is very simple"

I just love it when people invoke such phrases and then expound with horrendously contrived and convoluted logic.

Posted by Josh Reiter at September 18, 2006 08:27 PM

The Geneva Convention addresses the treatment and conditions of detention of prisoners of war. If there were a dispute as to the category of a prisoner, then he would be afforded the protection of the Convention (Article 5) until the dispute is resolved. Article 5 requires that a competent tribunal determine the disposition of the prisoner. Treatment of the prisoner would then always fall within the scope of the Geneva Convention or by the laws governing the "competent tribunal." The Supreme Court has held that American law does not support the current methods of detention and treatment of prisoners, whether they are called prisoners of war or "illegal combatants."

Posted by John Chen at September 18, 2006 11:07 PM

The biggest long-term problem, according to most economists, is the current-account deficit.

So, what you are saying is that there is a consensus of economists - where have I heard that reasoning before? I am currently studying economics with arguably some of the best economists in our country, and they strongly disagree with you on this. The relevant quote is "If someone offers you a loan at these interest rates, you take it!" The slightly longer explanation is that if your economy is growing a 4% real, and someone offers you a 2% real loan, you take the loan and invest it in your economy. (If you are the government, taking the loan and doing anything with it that you would have done anyway is an investment, since the government only exists as a leach on society)

Posted by David Summers at September 19, 2006 07:36 AM

Mike: Let me sum up: The Supreme Court says that we can lock up enemy combatants for the duration of hostilities. There is broad agreement that enemy combatants should not have the right to remain silent or a lawyer present during questioning. I say that the rest (including the nature of aggressive questioning) is up to Congress. You say that it is already illegal to do aggressive questioning and that allowing it is at the heart of the national debate. I say that the national debate is moot and that locking up enemy combatants indefinitely with no trial other than to confirm they are an enemy combatant is a bad idea politically as a baseline. You appear to have conceded my main thesis:

1) There has been no need for sacrifice in the War on Terror and Krugman knows this
2) That Krugman disengenuously appealed to reader's poor understanding of economics to make Bush look bad
3) That Krugman is pillorying the Bush administration for making the US look bad by fiddling with the Geneva Conventions when the Supreme Court interpretation of the Geneva Conventions results a terrible US image abroad too.

Please tell me your version of what the issues you disagree with me on and what your proposed alternative is.

Posted by Sam Dinkin at September 19, 2006 09:11 AM

You say that it is already illegal to do aggressive questioning and that allowing it is at the heart of the national debate.

No, "aggressive questioning" is a vague term that describes various things that are and are not illegal. Aggressive questioning could mean that you stomp into a room and shout and bang the walls a few times, which has never has been an illegal form of questioning in any jurisdiction.

I say that torture is illegal. If you wrap a man's face with Saran wrap and then subject him to mock drowning, that's not aggressive questioning, it's torture. If you cram a thick feeding tube up a man's nose twice a day without anesthesia, that's torture. If you string up a hooded man with broken ribs against with his arms behind his back until he asphyxiates and dies, that's torture and manslaughter.

There is no need for any "debate" about what we should "allow". The debate is about the truth, not about priorities. It's about the simple fact that the Bush Administration wants to legalize the torture of detainees in the war on terrorism. They just don't want to call it torture, they want to use odious euphemisms like "aggressive questioning". They want to whitewash their way out of not just international treaties, but also out of American criminal law and even basic human decency.

It is true that elements of the Supreme Court are excusing these crimes, but they aren't any more forthright about it than the White House is. Since they haven't (and presumably won't) openly legalized torture and murder, it will still be possible to prosecute the perpetrators for some time. But maybe not forever, because there are various ways to pardon, immunize, or otherwise protect the torturers. Indeed, they have already used the slap-on-the-wrist method.

That Krugman is pillorying the Bush administration for making the US look bad by fiddling with the Geneva Conventions when the Supreme Court interpretation of the Geneva Conventions results a terrible US image abroad too.

I do not understand why you keep choking on the word "torture". It's just two syllables; it's a lot simpler than your circumlocutions. Torture makes America look bad. Actually I do understand. You want this to be a discussion among gentlemen; you think that it's just not constructive criticism to use gutter words like "torture" and "manslaughter". But it's actually the opposite. Criticism won't be constructive unless we call a spade a spade. It won't do to sugarcoat these things.

Posted by Mike Johnson at September 19, 2006 09:55 AM

"There is no need for any "debate" about what we should "allow"." Mike, I am at a loss. You say that it is the heart of the debate, then you say there is nothing to debate. I say the debate (if there is something to debate) is moot.

FYI, the word "torture" doesn't appear in the Constitution. The 8th amendment does forbid "cruel and unusual punishment". Loaded words that mean different things to different people. That's why torture's topical these days. Using load words is also a way to escalate and turn the debate into an argument. Krugman inflames opinion. I intend to put out the flames. Bait me some more, I could use the practice.

You have conceded all my points. I disagree with you on what is constructive. Thanks for visiting transterrestrial.com

Posted by Sam Dinkin at September 19, 2006 02:26 PM

You say that it is the heart of the debate

Those words were posted by MattJ, not me. I also didn't say that there is nothing to debate. There are still the plain facts.

FYI, the word "torture" doesn't appear in the Constitution.

No, and neither do the words "manslaughter", "basic", "human", or "decency". But they are in the dictionary.

The 8th amendment does forbid "cruel and unusual punishment".

I am talking about the criminal, not the unconstitutional.

Loaded words that mean different things to different people.

If you have any doubt that waterboarding is torture, you should try it sometime. These terms do have gray areas, but the entire discussion is well outside of them.

Posted by Mike Johnson at September 19, 2006 02:53 PM

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