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This is not as tragic a moment in western civilization as the sacking of Constantinople in 1453 or the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917, but it suffices as one of those sad moments we will regret over time.
First of all, he gives western civilization primacy over those barbarian Muslim Ottomans, who simply swept aside what was left of the Byzantine Empire. I wouldn't consider this event a harbinger of good things, but that's because no empire deserves any legitimacy, reverence or allegiance, whether it is western or not. This is racism on Professor Anderson's part.
Second, all the Bolsheviks did was something similar to what the Turks did. What the Russian people needed was to energize solutions to their own problems in 1917, which would not have been possible had the war continued. Lenin thus swept aside the Kerensky government, whose war policies doomed it to failure. Kerensky and other liberals and leftists had already done part of what needed to be done by ousting the Tsar from power. Removing a corrupt and brutal power by itself, however, only leaves a vacuum if it is not accompanied by a positive and energetic program for change. That Kenensky did not have and Lenin did. The Bolshevik program was imperfect and, years later under Stalin, would become a grotesque imitation of Tsarist rule. Nevertheless, it was the best choice for the Russian people in 1917. Professor Anderson appears to be little more than a rank ideologue cursing the darkness rather than lighting a candle.
Professor Anderson finally gets around to admitting that "some" the Bush administration's economic policies were "bad, if not a disastrous." OK, I love understatement, too, Professor. He accuses Professor Krugman of being an anti-Bush partisan in his attacks.
Perhaps Professor Krugman is a partisan hack, but it's difficult to prove it based on critiques of the Bush administration. The administration's policies have been disastrous. Not just some of them, but all of them taken together. It will be hard to imagine any Wall Street big shot being held accountable for the collapse of a large investment firm or any other piece of rubble in this debacle; the laws were abolished Senator Gramm and Senator McCain, then signed into law by Mr. Bush the Frat Boy (and President Reagan and President Bush the Preppy and, lest we be accused of being partisan, President Clinton). By this time, there were no laws to break, so they broke none.
A deregulated market with only a few players, all of which suffer from corporate elephantiasis, does not self-regulate; it descends into a murky hell of greed and self-aggrandizement. A rising tide lifts all boats? Not any more, it doesn't. A rising stock market did not benefit common Americans, who saw their wages stagnate, if they were still drawing any after many jobs were outsourced to China and India. However, while a souring Dow meant nothing to stiffs like you and me, we will share in the hard times to come as stock prices drop like a rock in the sea.
As a result of this, I, who eight years ago owned no stock, now have a portfolio that includes Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Bear Sterns. AIG and will soon have several large banks as well. I never dreamed I would be so rich. Why am I worried?
Professor Anderson accuses the Bush administration of being socialist because of its recent takeovers of failing private firms and turns around to accuse Professor Krugman of believing the administration is not socialist enough. The fact is that the administration's actions are, like President Hoover's before he left office in 1933, too little and too late. Krugman's argument is that they may also be misdirected, since the real danger is the freezing of the credit markets.
Perhaps the solution will be found in a new New Deal. However, the New Deal was not, as Professor Anderson would have us believe, a socialist lite program that was set in place as soon as FDR was inaugurated. President Roosevelt was no profound intellectual; in fact, he compares only slightly favorably to President Reagan in that department. The tip I give FDR over Reagan is that he was in no way, shape or form the ideologue that Reagan was. Roosevelt had his brain trust, and he let them propose ideas. He would try anything and everything until he found something that worked.
That is the approach I want President Obama to take after he assumes power. I doesn't have to be socialism, it most certainly won't be unregulated capitalism, but it just has to work.
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