THE STASH MAY 5, 2009
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Well, this is encouraging, both as a window onto Obama's style, and because these guys have a lot of smart things to say. From Newsweek's Evan Thomas:
Mindful of his predecessor, Barack Obama seems to be trying harder to make sure he hears all sides. On the night of April 27, for instance, the president invited to the White House some of his administration's sharpest critics on the economy, including New York Times columnist Paul Krugman and Columbia University economist Joseph Stiglitz. Over a roast-beef dinner, Obama listened and questioned while Krugman and Stiglitz, both Nobel Prize winners, pushed for more aggressive government intervention in the banking system.
Thomas goes on to argue that, even with such meetings, Obama isn't like to escape the intellectual isolation of the presidential bubble. Maybe. But the point isn't that Obama needs to change his thinking on a long list of issues. Just that he, like any president, should have his assumptions challenged from time to time. And I think it would be hard to have dinner with Stiglitz and Krugman without accomplishing that.
(Via Ben Smith.)
--Noam Scheiber
1 comments
What does it mean to hear, "all sides of an issue"?
For example, what issue qualifies?
Should we debate all sides of the argument that, regarding congenital intelligence, men have a greater capacity than women in grasping mathematical concepts and skills? How about homosexualty....is it a natural behavior or a deviant one? Or abortion: a woman's right to choose?...or premeditated murder?
These debates [along with all the others] pop up and down, in and out of media all the time. But what is even more crucial is the manner in which "all sides" agree on the sides that never get to broach an opinion at all.
This is especially the case when debating "all sides" of the relationship between government and the economy. Here there are no real boundaries to speak of on the conservative end of the spectrum. From rabid Libertarians to deeply entrenched advocates of state capitalism, they all get a chance to debate Larry and Noam on CNBC.
On the left end of the spectrum, however, there is a line beyond which few in the mainstream media dare to go...or even care to go: political economy.
Political economy? What's that?
Forty years ago, you almost never saw [or heard] the word "capitalism" used to describe our economy. Instead, the media called it "the free enterprise system". Then with the crack up of the USSR and all the ancilliary "socialist" regimes, capitalism started sprouting up everywhere. We no longer had to feel shame in using the word. We could actually be proud to say it.
But not so, political economy. Why is that? Because the very words "political economy" force you to investigate the relationship between political power and economic wealth. For instance: how do they help define each other? how do they reinforce each others interests? how are the transactions carried out between Washington and New York? how do they work symbiotically to keep others from exposing the fraud at the very heart of these relationship?
In reading opinions like Noam Scheiber's, the most pertinent question of all to ask is this one: does he enable this fraud self-consciously? or is he largely oblivious to it?
One might wonder, "how can he possibly be oblivious to it?" But that is really not hard to fathom once you are ready to acknowledge that, throughout the mainstream media, they all read each other's stuff.
You can't think hard about something you hardly ever come into contact with....right?
george walton
- iambiguous
May 5, 2009 at 4:24am