I’ve gotten sort of out of the habit <$NoAd$>of linking to Paul Krugman’s columns, largely because I think there’s so much over overlap between our audiences that the links are redundant.
(In Venn Diagram terms, overlap in the sense of my little circle off in some out of the way part of his big circle.)
But Friday’s column is a true stand-out for its unadorned enumeration of what’s happening.
Note the last four grafs …
Awhile back, George Akerlof, the Nobel laureate in economics, described what’s happening to public policy as “a form of looting.” Some scoffed at the time, but now even publications like The Economist, which has consistently made excuses for the administration, are sounding the alarm.
To be fair, the looting is a partly bipartisan affair. More than a few Democrats threw their support behind the Medicare bill, the energy bill or both. But the Bush administration and the Republican leadership in Congress are leading the looting party. What are they thinking?
The prevailing theory among grown-up Republicans â yes, they still exist â seems to be that Mr. Bush is simply doing whatever it takes to win the next election. After that, he’ll put the political operatives in their place, bring in the policy experts and finally get down to the business of running the country.
But I think they’re in denial. Everything we know suggests that Mr. Bush’s people have given as little thought to running America after the election as they gave to running Iraq after the fall of Baghdad. And they will have no idea what to do when things fall apart.
I made a series of similar points in my column in The Hill this week, and many others are putting the pieces together too.
Now back to the Empire essay.
My kingdom for an empire … essay.
