Say what you will about Tyler Cowen, the man knows how to concern troll. The excerpt is lengthy, but worth it for purposes of admiring the sheer bloody cheek.
Krugman has shown a remarkable and impressive capacity to reinvent himself, more than once. He could reinvent himself again — in a truly Humean direction — and become the most important American public intellectual — and perhaps intellectual — of his time. Or he could keep his current status as a sharp and brilliant someone who has an enormous number of followers but relatively little influence over actual events, and perhaps, like most of us, won’t be read much fifty years from now.
The reality is that neither the early nor the more recent Krugman is especially convincing on debt, and if anything the conjunction between the two shows that switching sides isn’t quite the same thing as changing your mind. The odds are that government spending cuts are not literally budget balance destroyers on net. How about writing a NYRB essay that lays out the short-run negative output gradient to austerity, presents why austerity is considered a serious option nonetheless, discusses catch-up and bounce back effects and their relevant time horizons, analyzes what kinds of policies are actually possible in a 17 (27) nation collective, engages with the best public choice arguments (including Buchanan and Wagner) on a serious level, ponders the merits and demerits of worst case thinking, and ruminates on the nature of leadership in a way which shows some tussling with Thucydides and Churchill? Surely that is within Krugman’s capabilities and if it still comes out Keynesian or left-wing, great, at least someone will have seen those arguments through. Such an essay would stand a far greater chance of influencing me, or other serious readers, or for that matter President Obama. We should hold Krugman to the very high standard of actually expecting that he produce such work. Not many others are capable of it.
There is a kind of hallelujah chorus for Krugman on some of the left-wing economics blogs. The funny thing is, it’s hurting Krugman most of all.
Right.
"Why doesn't Paul Krugman renounce his popular platform in the New York Times and write a Humean article that 'tussles with Thucydies' and takes the Heritage Foundation seriously? That will be Taken Seriously by Serious People such as myself... and the President of the United States!"
This is perhaps the most pompous post to ever appear on the Internet; you have to applaud. But it's also pure trolling. Krugman sees it as such, which is probably a big part of why he pisses these people off so much. I suppose though once you have a Nobel Prize on your mantlepiece the "please take my blog seriously or I'll hold my breath and turn blue" ploy rings a bit hollow.
"Civility" is, again, censorship or attempted censorship by other means, in our debased discourse. As I've said before.
Also too "tussling with Thucydides" will henceforth and forever be my preferred euphemism for masturbation.
Mas. Strictly comedy -- "regularly" means "almost always," not "always"! That angel, that one, over there, dancing on that pin? He's mooning you. Your argument is invalid: gaze at this Newt Gingrich snake picture.