Bad Ideas Flourish Because They Are In

I Don't Want A Job In The Administration; I Think I'm More Effective Carping From The Sidelines.

Obama Is Very Much An Establishment Sort Of Guy. The Whole Image Of Him As A Transcendent Figure Was Based On Style Rather Than Substance. If You Actually Looked At What He Said, Not How He Said It, He Said Very Establishment Things. He's A Moderate, Cautious, Ameliorative Guy. He Tends To Gravitate Toward Beltway Conventional Wisdom.

Our Popular Economics Writers, However, Are Not In The Business Of Giving Their Readers A Ringside Seat On The Research Action; With No Exception I Can Think Of, They Use Their Books To Do An End Run Around The Normal Structure Of Scholarship, To Preach Ideas That Few Serious Economists Share. Often, These Ideas Are Not Just At Odds With The Professional Consensus; They Are Demonstrably Wrong, And Sometimes Terminally Silly. But They Sound Good To The Unwary Reader.

Political Figures Who Talk A Lot About Liberty And Freedom Invariably Turn Out To Mean The Freedom To Not Pay Taxes And Discriminate Based On Race; Freedom To Hold Different Ideas And Express Them, Not So Much.

I've Always Believed That A Speculative Bubble Need Not Lead To A Recession, As Long As Interest Rates Are Cut Quickly Enough To Stimulate Alternative Investments. But I Had To Face The Fact That Speculative Bubbles Usually Are Followed By Recessions. My Excuse Has Been That This Was Because The Policy Makers Moved Too Slowly - That Central Banks Were Typically Too Slow To Cut Interest Rates In The Face Of A Burst Bubble, Giving The Downturn Time To Build Up A Lot Of Momentum.