Informed Speculation

Hard to believe this came from Paul Krugman, but look at the opening of his latest column:

What would have happened if hanging chads and the Supreme Court hadn’t denied Al Gore the White House in 2000? Many things would clearly have been different over the next eight years.

But one thing would probably have been the same: There would have been a huge housing bubble and a financial crisis when the bubble burst. And if Democrats had been in power when the bad news arrived, they would have taken the blame, even though things would surely have been as bad or worse under Republican rule.

Well, despite his little dig at the end, isn’t that really an admission by Krugman that he routinely engages in partisan hackery?  I mean, has anyone else noticed his long-standing history of blaming all of the current economic problems on George W. Bush and his administration?

Then he goes and gives the game away by admitting that the housing-bubble-led credit crisis was not at all a function of the Bush presidency, but a long-simmering problem that would have exploded under Al Gore, as well, had he won in 2000 (and please, no nonsense about Gore winning – there is only ONE way you win the presidency in this country, and that’s through the Electoral College.  George W. Bush won – get OVER it, already).

Krugman goes on, of course, to blame the crisis on Republicans…but, as I noted last week, his latest tack, now that Obama has settled into office and the expiration date on “Blame it on Bush” grows close, is to blame it mostly on Reagan instead, though he does admit Clinton and the Democrats  had some role (well, it’s a classic Krugman ‘admission’, in that it neglects to mention Clinton by name, or – surely an untintended oversight – the Democratic Party, either):

For much of the past 30 years, politics and policy here and in America have moved in tandem. We had Reagan; they had Thatcher. We had the Garn-St. Germain Act of 1982, which dismantled New Deal-era banking regulation; they had the Big Bang of 1986, which deregulated London’s financial industry. Both nations had an explosion of household debt and saw their financial systems become increasingly unsound.

In both countries, the conservatives who pushed through deregulation lost power in the 1990s. In each case, however, the new leaders were as infatuated with “innovative” finance as their predecessors were. Robert Rubin, in his years as the Treasury secretary, and Gordon Brown, in his years as the chancellor of the Exchequer, preached the same gospel.

Krugman’s point is that Brown, like Bush, is bearing the blame for policies that he perpetuated rather than initiated.  That’s fine as far it goes, but remember that Krugman never extended such a courtesy towards Bush when it mattered – rather, he heaped buckets of derision upon his head at every opportunity, and never lost a chance to throw blame and aspersion in his direction.  Now that Gordon Brown, a liberal politician, is in trouble, out come the apologetics.

As interest rates rise and begin to choke off the nascent recovery (housing refinances have already sputtered out, as rising rates mean closing costs outweigh savings for almost everyone), an increase feuled by the outrageous expanse in federal spending that Krugman has loudly advocated for, expect much more in this vein from Krugman’s corner…