Krugman: The Focus Hocus-Pocus

[ProSense]

The Focus Hocus-Pocus

By PAUL KRUGMAN

Democrats, declared Evan Bayh in an Op-Ed article on Wednesday in The Times, “overreached by focusing on health care rather than job creation during a severe recession.” Many others have been saying the same thing: the notion that the Obama administration erred by not focusing on the economy is hardening into conventional wisdom.

But I have no idea what, if anything, people mean when they say that. The whole focus on “focus” is, as I see it, an act of intellectual cowardice — a way to criticize President Obama’s record without explaining what you would have done differently.

<...>

Of course, there’s a subtext to the whole line that health reform was a mistake: namely, that Democrats should stop acting like Democrats and go back to being Republicans-lite. Parse what people like Mr. Bayh are saying, and it amounts to demanding that Mr. Obama spend the next two years cringing and admitting that conservatives were right.

There is an alternative: Mr. Obama can take a stand.

For one thing, he still has the ability to engineer significant relief to homeowners, one area where his administration completely dropped the ball during its first two years. Beyond that, Plan B is still available. He can propose real measures to create jobs and aid the unemployed and put Republicans on the spot for standing in the way of the help Americans need.

Would taking such a stand be politically risky? Yes, of course. But Mr. Obama’s economic policy ended up being a political disaster precisely because he tried to play it safe. It’s time for him to try something different.

Evan Bayh, UGH!

Best retirement ever! Take the watch and get off the stage.

[ThomCat]

1. Obama needs to start listening to Krugman. He has been far too right

far too often.

Obama, on the other hand, has been disastrously wrong.

[ProSense]

4. Krugman supports the health care plan

As for Obama, "disastrously wrong"? No.

[Name removed]

10. Deleted message

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[Jennicut]

2. Why was Bayh EVER considered as a running mate?

He is so nauseating.

[pscot]

5. Truely creepy

[ibegurpard]

3. do you agree with Krugman's point?

because it sure seems like he's got some criticism for Obama in there..

[ProSense]

6. What is this,

"because it sure seems like he's got some criticism for Obama in there.."

...a test?

Here's where I disagree with Krugman

Mr. Obama’s problem wasn’t lack of focus; it was lack of audacity...Could Mr. Obama actually have offered such a plan? He might not have been able to get a big plan through Congress, or at least not without using extraordinary political tactics. Still, he could have chosen to be bold — to make Plan A the passage of a truly adequate economic plan, with Plan B being to place blame for the economy’s troubles on Republicans if they succeeded in blocking such a plan.

If he couldn't get it through Congress, how would that have changed anything? Krugman seems to think that simply being able to say Republicans blocked a bigger plan nearly two years ago would have made a difference. I really don't agree. A blocked plan doesn't produce results and would have had no impact on people's frustration right now.

[Name removed]

7. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[ProSense]

9. I know what Krugman said.

"make Plan A the passage of a truly adequate economic plan, with Plan B being to place blame for the economy’s troubles on Republicans if they succeeded in blocking such a plan."

Krugman knows damn well plan B was it.

"WITHOUT using extraordinary political tactics" (just like Johnson did to pass Medicare and the Civil Rights Act!)..."

Math:

LBJ had 66 to 68 Democrats to work with.

President Obama had 58.

[ProudDad]

11. Math: a large number of the democrats voted AGAINST

Medicare and the Civil Rights Act...

Johnson made sure he had enough votes the old fashioned, good ole USAmerican way -- he threatened and bribed the fuckers... He had veto power and used it!

You're still "thinking" within the constraints of your little box...

[ProSense]

13. Math:

This isn't 1964, and still LBJ had a larger number of Democrats.

Now, what are people arguing: That in lieu of or in addition to Democratic votes, President Obama should have gotten the Republicans to vote for a larger stimulus?

Which Republicans: The ones that people are demanding he not work with because they have no intention of working with him?

[ProudDad]

8. Bayh is partly correct.

The Obamabunch should have attacked joblessness with tooth and claw instead of continuing the bush policy of rewarding the banksters for pissing on us all! (AND KEEPING AN IMPORTANT PORTION OF THE BUSH economic team to do it!!! And the bush war team! Talk about tone deaf!)

Instead, Obama hired some of the worst perpetrators of the financial disaster to "advise him" and run the financial offices of the administration! How freakin' DUMB was that??? (Hillary probably introduced them too. "I'll tell you what, Hill, you introduce me to Summers and I'll make you Secretary of State")

It would have been do-able to force the banksters to right-size the mortgages that were underwater and the fraudulent toxic ones. And it would have been popular...

It would have been a good idea to fund local credit unions in every community who would loan within the community to local businesses that keep the money IN the community with those 16 trillion of loan guarantees rather then shovel more profits at the banksters...

Health care? If the Obamites had pushed hard for actual Health Care Reform instead of a bailout for the health insurance mafia and Big PhRMA with a few crumbs to keep the plebes quiet; and had left all viable options on the table including Improved and Enhanced Medicare for All, he would have been better off.

So Bayh is correct in these details...

Of course, he probably didn't think that way two years ago...

[ProSense]

12. Bayh isn't correct

Bayh is a confused fool. He opposes spending, wanted a freeze and his idea of job creation is Third Way drivel

We also overreached by focusing on health care rather than job creation during a severe recession. It was a noble aspiration, but $1 trillion in new spending and a major entitlement expansion are best attempted when the Treasury is flush and the economy strong, hardly our situation today.

<...>

A good place to start would be tax reform. Get rates down to make American businesses globally competitive. Reward savings and investment. Simplify the code to reduce compliance costs and broaden the base. In 1986, this approach attracted bipartisan support and fostered growth.

The stereotype of Democrats as wild-eyed spenders and taxers has been resurrected. To regain our political footing, we must prove to moderates that Democrats can make tough choices. Democrats should ban earmarks until the budget is balanced. The amount saved would be modest — but with ordinary Americans sacrificing so much, the symbolic power of politicians cutting their own perks is huge.

Democrats should support a freeze on federal hiring and pay increases. Government isn’t a privileged class and cannot be immune to the times.

[ProudDad]

14. According to the article in the OP...as I've indicated...Bayh is partly correct...

You posted it -- didn't you read it?

Also read my posts -- I never said Bayh was right back then (although most of the stimulus measures taken by the corporate owned Obamabushites were doomed to fail for everyone but the banksters - and I said it back then)...

[ProSense]

16. I read it, and I don't agree

Bayh isn't partly correct. In fact, he likely thinks the stimulus was a waste of money. He doesn't support infrastructure spending.

His idea of focusing on jobs is BS tax cuts for wealthy people and corporations.

Krugman's point is that simply saying the administration needs to focus on jobs isn't saying much. If the solutions being proposed suck, what's the point?

The President is focused on jobs, and even if you want to argue that he's not focused enough, at least his focus will result in more job creation than the BS Bayh is pushing.

[ProudDad]

17. No, Obama is NOT focused on "jobs"

At least if the administration's corporate-directed actions to date are examined...

He's into feeding the horse to feed the sparrows, pretty much the Ray-Gun program.

The "stimulus" consisted of shoveling a tiny fraction of the $trillions that were given away to the banksters to State and Local government entities (also driven by corporate interests) to be used to patch up and expand the dying industrial growth "infrastructure" of roads and highways and leaky buildings.

A little bit trickled down into education, some Pell grants and Special Ed funding, but WAY less than AIG's bailout (to make Goldman Sachs whole)...

There's been very little "stimulus" of the real job creators -- small businesses; mom and pop operations. In fact, credit has been frozen for them.

BUT, more importantly...

We need a new paradigm for the Long Emergency.

We need funding of high speed rail powered by solar and wind and a revival of sailing ships for ocean travel (or else long distance travel will be a memory in the second half of the 21st Century).

We need funding for reLOCALizing our economies - NOT more globalization...

We need help to bring food production and distribution to local communities (no more 3000 mile Caesar salads). Tear up the asphalt and replant farms...

To finance those reLOCALized economies we could have used some of the trillions thrown away at Citigroup and Goldman Sachs and Bank of America and General Motors to create local credit unions in every town and city in the country; who would fund LOCAL enterprises and initiatives.

We need to think of powering down, of smaller living spaces, of no more 9000 mile petroleum fueled supply lines for cheap Chinese crap that ends up in the land fill within 6 months.

We need to focus on a stimulus package that renews the Earth and Nature as a support system for ALL of Earth's creatures instead of polluting the air, water and land that we all need to survive.

This means FEWER road and highways. This means organic, labor intensive agriculture (JOBS!) instead of Franken-petro-food.

This means promoting better, more fulfilling lives instead of bigger, shinier corpo-lives...

[ProudDad]

18. I was talking about Bayh critizising Obama's focus on

Health insurance and drug corporation stimulus instead of jobs...

That's correct...

The rest of Bayh's op-ed is bullshit...

As is Obama's handler's drive to prop up the dying global capitalist experiment to "create jobs"...

[JohnWxy]

15. recommended!!