Krugman Arsemageddon

Posted on | April 8, 2014 | 32 Comments

by Smitty

We had one of “those” incidents that you don’t document in detail, but can trigger a neologism, the other night at Schloss Smitty:

Arsemageddon (n): The toddler has a soupy delivery. You think he’s merely wet through & blow away half the house getting to the change table

— Keynesian Meanwich (@smitty_one_each) April 7, 2014

This tweet came to mind while reading Krugman’s “even if it’s true, it’s not ‘true’ true” rejection of Motivated Numeracy and Enlightened Self-Government, which was the opening feature on Ezra Klein’s U2 tribute site, Vox.

Having read the original research paper in some detail, I’ll venture that the general issues to which it points are that

people aren’t going back to first principles when analyzing an issue, and
confirmation bias, which the paper essentially elaborates upon.

Summarizing, the authors say that everyone has their ideology, either collectivist for Krugman and ilk, or individualist for the rest of us adults. Presented with research, people either make it fit their ideology, or try to rationalize some way that the research has been corrupted.

Krugman attempts to have it both ways, accepting the Holy Research as stated, and then attempting to worm his way out of it:

Krugman	Smitty
But here’s the thing: the lived experience is that this effect is not, in fact, symmetric between liberals and conservatives. Yes, liberals are sometimes subject to bouts of wishful thinking.	I’m a Nobel Lariat: watch me tie myself in knots!
But can anyone point to a liberal equivalent of conservative denial of climate change,	I’ll go with: (a) Nobody argues “constant climate”, and (b) a great example is the liberal argument that life begins when some pencil-neck, e.g. Krugman, or a jackwagon in a judicial robe, says it begins.
or the “unskewing” mania late in the 2012 campaign,	Krugman may have half a point here; I know I didn’t want to believe America was stupid enough to re-elect #OccupyResoluteDesk. Forgive my irrational optimism, please.
or the frantic efforts to deny that Obamacare is in fact covering a lot of previously uninsured Americans?	Oh, ObamaCare is covering all Americans in ruin, both insured and uninsured. Only somebody like a Krugman figure would deny this. What a poopy-head.
I don’t mean liberals taking positions you personally disagree with — I mean examples of overwhelming rejection of something that shouldn’t even be in dispute.	For example, the Bill of Rights in general, and the Second Amendment in particular, on which Progressives continue to gnaw with a termite-like frenzy.

Krugman’s self-blindness leads him to write later, emphasis mine:

At this point I could castigate Ezra for his both-sides-do-it article — but instead, let me pose this as a question: why are the two sides so asymmetric? People want to believe what suits their preconceptions, so why the big difference between left and right on the extent to which this desire trumps facts?
One possible answer would be that liberals and conservatives are very different kinds of people — that liberalism goes along with a skeptical, doubting — even self-doubting — frame of mind; “a liberal is someone who won’t take his own side in an argument.”

The reason for the asymmetry, Krugman, is that you’re a collectivist crapflooder drawing on a colostomy bag as vast as the national debt. Conservatives are wholly incapable of competing with the combination of hubris and humus you bring. It is with a certain amount of awe that I extend my definition:

arsemageddon, (n) 2: The collective wisdom of Paul Krugman.

If anyone can name a bigger idiot, I’ll cheerfully change this. Granted, Krugman has rivals, but I defy you to name a bigger one.

via RBPundit

Category: Economics

Comments

32 Responses to “Krugman Arsemageddon”

ariyadesai01
April 8th, 2014 @ 8:25 am

RT @smitty_one_each: Krugman Arsemageddon http://t.co/HouSA8uubR #TCOT
Dana
April 8th, 2014 @ 8:36 am

Mr McCain’s blog sidekick Smitty wrote:

If anyone can name a bigger idiot, I’ll cheerfully change this. Granted, Krugman has rivals, but I defy you to name a bigger one.

Barack Hussein Obama. The esteemed Dr Krugman at least tries to explain himself; Mr Obama simply takes the attitude, “I won.”
smitty
April 8th, 2014 @ 8:45 am

Then we veer into a discussion of mere idiocy vs. diabolical intent.
Quartermaster
April 8th, 2014 @ 8:45 am

I wouldn’t say he’s explaining anything. He’s trying to obfuscate and hoping people won’t notice. As a practical matter, there’s no difference between an over educated idiot like Krugman, and a mendacious idiot like Zer0.

From a sign on the door of a Geology Prof at Tenn Tech:

Eschew obfuscation, venerate perspicuity
Dana
April 8th, 2014 @ 8:45 am

Our Nobel Economics Prize winning columnist’s biggest problem is that he touts the success of Keynesianism, without understanding in the slightest what the results have been. We applied Keynesian thinking with the New Deal, and the Depression continued on for years and years.

Then came World War II, and our economy skyrocketed. Dr Krugman sees that as the full application of Keynesian thinking, but it was actually the results of a very special condition: the need for large amounts of mass produced industrial goods, which were quickly expended, and required prompt replacement, all at a time when we were the world’s largest steel producer, manufacturing nation and oil exporters, and during which the other major industrial powers were seeing their industries being blown up. By the end of the war, the United States had 45% of the world’s industrial capacity.

Further, at the end of the war, 99% of our national debt was held by Americans; that meant that, as we serviced the debt, the money was remaining in our economy.

Keynesian economics also requires that, during good times, the government pays down the debt. Unfortunately, that isn’t what we have done, but kept piling it on. We engaged in, essentially, Keynesian economic stimulus every fornicating year, and have, in effect, inoculated our economy to such stimulus; it became the new normal, which is why the 2009 stimulus plan had so little impact. The esteemed Dr Krugman turns out to be half a Keynesian, and is surprised that that doesn’t work.
Quartermaster
April 8th, 2014 @ 8:46 am

I don’t think Krugman has enough intelligence for diabolical intent. He is one of Satan’s useful idiots, however, just as Zer0 is.
DarthLevin
April 8th, 2014 @ 9:00 am

In our house the word was “assplosion” but I like “arsemageddon”. Thankfully mine are past that age.

Our word for Krugman’s writings, we don’t use around the kids. Little pitchers, and all that.
Rosalie
April 8th, 2014 @ 9:05 am

“If anyone can name a bigger idiot, I’ll cheerfully change this.”
Let’s face it, there are just too many. How about idiot of the day?
texlovera
April 8th, 2014 @ 9:09 am

In the end, what difference does it make?
scarymatt
April 8th, 2014 @ 9:28 am

…that liberalism goes along with a skeptical, doubting — even self-doubting — frame of mind;

This should induce an O’Roukean outburst in the reader. The only thing liberals are skeptical about is anything a non-liberal says. This is human, and any person honest with himself will admit to having to struggle against this to prevent it.

Krugtron’s columnist career is at odds with his previous work as an economist. For crying out loud, he gets Econ 101 stuff wrong based on textbooks that he wrote. It’s difficult to take such people as seriously as we should, but this is dangerous, as the last 6 years have shown (not to mention pretty much the entire 20th century).
Dana
April 8th, 2014 @ 9:36 am

Sounds like a contest to me! Our host could have an Idiot of the Day column.
Julie Pascal
April 8th, 2014 @ 9:42 am

The Asymmetry… I’d say that it’s because anyone, by definition, believes that they hold a rational point of view. So you only notice when the other guy insists on something that is in all ways obviously counter to fact… you’re blind, by definition, to your own blindness.

Now, sure, I believe absolutely that “liberals do it more” but I’m willing to entertain the notion that “loud, obnoxious, liberals do it more”.

It’s like the liberal internet warrior who uses the most abusive, crude, language (incivility!) and goes to “conservative” places and picks fights and someone calls them a bad name and they get all upset at how they are abused but they never notice that they just spent about a thousand words attacking your religion, your gender, calling you homosexual slurs, etc., etc.,

And to be fair… maybe there are conservative internet warriors who troll liberal sites and are similarly nasty. If you don’t go there, how would you know?

But liberal mainstream media denial of science and reason? That’s a bit easier to quantify and, sweetheart, it’s blatant.
Frankly Bored
April 8th, 2014 @ 9:44 am

A liberal equivalent… How about the verifiable fact that unborn children are in fact human beings?
To Krugman (what a heteronormative oppressive patriarchically micro-aggressive name…shouldn’t it be Krugmyn?) and his co-religionists, a person who contributes enough CO to change the global mean temperature 0.0000000000000000000001% of 1 degree C over one hundred years is somehow (magic?) more morally culpable than someone who jams scissors into the brain of an unborn child. I don’t think it’s a case of idiocy vs. diabolical intent, more like diabolically inspired idiocy…
Hanzo
April 8th, 2014 @ 10:10 am

That kwazy Kwugman. No, I can’t name a BIGGER idiot than Kwugman. Well, maybe Medea Benjamin, but she’s not supposed to be a lofty, erudite economist.
Dana
April 8th, 2014 @ 10:22 am

Mrs Pascal wrote:

but they never notice that they just spent about a thousand words attacking your religion, your gender, calling you homosexual slurs, etc., etc.,

Emphasis mine.

That’s a major point, because our good friends on the oh-so-inclusive multicultural left just love to throw around insults calling people bundles of kindling or anything else which labels their opponents the “bottom” in anal intercourse. It’s curious — pun intended — that so many of them see accusations of homosexuality, something they so vigorously insist is just fine and normal and happy, as insults.
Dana
April 8th, 2014 @ 10:24 am

I’m sorry, but was Dr Krugman supposed to be a lofty, erudite economist?
Dana
April 8th, 2014 @ 10:27 am

One of us is surprised that any professor at a school in Tennessee would know those words.
TheOtherAndrewB
April 8th, 2014 @ 10:47 am

Krugman wants an equivalent to “climate change denial”? How about the current liberal notion that there are 54 different gender “choices”? How about the fact that many people with prestigious degrees cannot read and comprehend the simple language of the First Amendment? How about the people who have screamed about the McCarthy era and the blacklist for 60 years being the same people who hound a man out of his job for having an unpopular opinion? How about a “liberal” commentator questioning the maternity of Sarah Palin’s child, and others condemning her for making a choice to bear that child?
Rob Crawford
April 8th, 2014 @ 10:57 am

Ah, the constantly questioning, doubting “liberal” mind. One of which was recently quoted as saying “I can’t be a bigot, I’m a liberal”.

They question so deeply their economics is based on the writings of a mid-1800s crank, their concept of liberty on early-1900s proto-fascists, and their understanding of science, well… they simply do not understand science. They cloak themselves in it — they’ll put on lab coats and publish papers in “peer reviewed journals” where their peers are equally brain-damaged cranks — but they won’t practice it.

And most importantly, they despise science. It is the outcome of human reason and effort, so to their primitive minds it is tainted, impure. Their only use for “science” is to allow them to chop away at the foundations of liberty and reason and faith, so as to drive humanity into bondage and, in the fantasies of too many of them, en into extinction.
Rosalie
April 8th, 2014 @ 11:06 am

There could also be pervert of the day. The material for both is endless (sadly).
Just Saying
April 8th, 2014 @ 11:15 am

Here let me sum up Krugman: “I’m an idiot and won’t admit it so will deflect and obfuscate the issue.”

There – you now understand everything you need to know about this buffoon…
smitty
April 8th, 2014 @ 11:18 am

It’s because the Left views all through the irrational lens of the flesh.
Hanzo
April 8th, 2014 @ 12:14 pm

Yes, that’s correct, supposed to be.
Quartermaster
April 8th, 2014 @ 12:45 pm

In his own mind. And I’m sure the world inside that head of his is vast beyond measure.
Quartermaster
April 8th, 2014 @ 12:45 pm

But, Krugman is a waste of 100% of the oxygen he consumes.
Quartermaster
April 8th, 2014 @ 12:46 pm

Bigot!
Dana
April 8th, 2014 @ 1:01 pm

I’m from Kentucky, where everything is better than in Tennessee.
Al Sharpton is a Hero | Regular Right Guy
April 8th, 2014 @ 3:11 pm

[…] Krugman Arsemageddon […]
Mike G.
April 8th, 2014 @ 6:53 pm

Ya know, the further north you get in the South, the more your IQ drops. Just sayin’.
K-Bob
April 8th, 2014 @ 6:58 pm

That original paper seems to add some real data to the growing set of concepts related to examinations of ideology.

The age of Enlightement featured a very popular concept (popular in drawing rooms, and other elements of uppercrust society, as much as in science) that was casually referred to as “disinterest.”

It was actually fun for the elites of the day to examine things from a point of disinterest. The rise of Progressivism wiped out any of the fun to be had, evidently. They replaced that intellectual exercise with the game of building towers of ideals from which to fling offal toward those in opposition.

The data on those more “numerate” (cf. the paper) suggests (to me, at least) that our Universities encourage this flight to idealism as a way to stake out one’s intellectual territory. As if knowledge were a matter of choosing sides, and intellect would be measured by the number of members in one’s coterie.

This explains a great deal of the behavior of the AGW Alarmists, as an example from “sciency-ness.” Likewise, the behavior of socialized medicine advocates among the Public Policy school graduates.

“Disinterest” was merely the quaint notion of not corrupting the outcome of experiment by relying heavily on preconceived notions about the outcome. It worked as well in philosophical inquiries and in political debate. It is still widely used as a cornerstone of successful negotiation. But politics is not about negotiation. (And I also am not finding much use for the definition that politics is “the art of the possible.”)

Politics today is about imposing one’s will. This unfortunate reality flows directly from idealism, enthroned.

Krugman will do whatever it takes to make sure his “gang” is the one to do the imposing.
Kirby McCain
April 8th, 2014 @ 9:10 pm

The climate change debate always bothers me. It’s actually a throw back idea. Prior to Einstein we had no clue how the sun worked. It was believed to be a constant state. So science of a century or two ago believed all climate change was a result of earthbound processes. Solar science is still in its infancy. So in 2005 when the media is happily covering Algore blaming Bush and man made climate change. They are at the same time blinding the public to real factors in climate change. Our sun, at a time in its eleven year cycle when it should be quiet, had been going nuts. That wouldn’t fit the narrative, would it? Before anyone tries explaining that away. There was this five hundred year event called The Little Ice Age during which few sun spots were detected. There was a sixteen year stretch in which none were detected. More recently the global warming crowd has been finding clever ways to explain away the pause in global warming. Let me take a stab at that one. The latest solar maximum was a non event. Krugman isn’t an idiot. He’s a creepy idiot. http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2005/07oct_afraid/
Kirby McCain
April 8th, 2014 @ 9:16 pm

No monkey trials in Kentucky, huh?