Paul Krugman: Electing Romney Is Like Electing Paul Ryan

[Lakhota]

By Sahil Kapur

Mitt Romney’s diversity of policy positions over the last decade has left conservatives and liberals wondering: What would he actually do as president? Would he return to his former, more moderate self, or would he embrace the ideological fervor of the right as he did during the primary?

According New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, it’s hardly a close call: A hypothetical President Romney would do pretty much what House Budget Chairman Paul Ryan tells him to do, because he won’t have much of a choice politically. And that, he argues, would be a disaster for the economy.

“Romney — well, who knows what Romney thinks. Romney’s economic advisers are not crazy,” Krugman told TPM in an interview. “But I think it’s unlikely Romney would have the leeway [to break from the Ryan mold].” The presumptive Republican nominee for president has effusively praised Ryan and, during the primary, attacked Newt Gingrich for criticizing him.

The Princeton professor and Nobel Prize-winning economist, who is touring his new book End This Depression Now!, said Romney would be wedded to Ryan’s economic policy prescriptions which have become too entrenched on the right: Above all, massive tax cuts for the rich and draconian spending cuts on programs for the less fortunate, which Krugman argues will amount to an “upward distribution of income plan.”

“You’re never going to get people in the Republican Party accepting the idea that unemployment and food stamps insurance are expansionary,” he said. “That they are actually policies that are good for employment. They’re too wedded to the notion that the undeserving poor … are the cause of unemployment. So I think they’re basically incapable of doing what needs to be done to support this economy.”

The conservative base eagerly wants its president to implement Ryan’s vision, which House Republicans overwhelmingly reaffirmed their support for late March. Anti-tax activist Grover Norquist, arguably the most influential outside figure among modern Republicans, says Romney’s role would be to rubber-stamp Ryan’s agenda.

“We don’t need a president to tell us in what direction to go. We know what direction to go. We want the Ryan budget,” he told New York magazine. “Pick a Republican with enough working digits to handle a pen to become president of the United States.” Of course, the GOP would still have to deal with rebelling Democrats, but a president on board with the broader approach would open up a major opportunity to advance at least parts of Ryan’s vision.

If Romney is elected president, Republicans “certainly will ditch the concern with deficits. They don’t care about deficits at all. Never have,” Krugman added. “But the trouble is they want a combination of policies that, while will on balance expand the deficit, will in fact be bad for the economy even so. Because the programs they really, really want to cut — which is aid to the poor — are the ones that matter for the economy right now.”

Paul Krugman: Electing Romney Is Like Electing Paul Ryan | TPMDC

 

[Oddball]

Ferretface Krugman.....I have half a mind to move this to the Humor sub-forum....

 

[whitehall]

Sounds good to me. Electing Barry Hussein is like....electing Karl Marx? Groucho Marx?

 

[WillowTree]

Paul Krugman can go stick his head up manifolds birth canal.

 

[SniperFire]

LOL

 

[Listening]

All the more reason to vote for Romney.

Get a job Lakhota....

 

[EdwardBaiamonte]

Because the programs they really, really want to cut — which is aid to the poor — are the ones that matter for the economy right now.”

What Washington really does - The Washington Post

Recently, Ron Haskins of the Brookings Institution, a Washington think tank, testified before the House Budget Committee on the growth of the 10-largest “means tested” federal programs that serve people who qualify by various definitions of poverty.


Here’s what Haskins reported: From 1980 to 2011, annual spending on these programs grew from $126 billion to $626 billion (all figures in inflation-adjusted “2011 dollars”); dividing this by the number of people below the government poverty line, spending went from $4,300 per poor person in 1980 to $13,000 in 2011. In 1962, spending per person in poverty was $516.


Haskins’s list includes Medicaid, food stamps (now called the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP), the earned-income tax credit (a wage subsidy for some low-income workers), and Pell Grants. There are other, smaller programs dedicated to the poor. A report from the Congressional Research Service estimated the total number at 83; Haskins puts the additional spending on programs below the 10 largest at about $210 billion. The total of all programs for the poor exceeds $800 billion.

 

[Lakhota]

Ferretface Krugman.....I have half a mind to move this to the Humor sub-forum....

Well, actually you have less than half a mind. You like to mess with my threads.

 

[Oddball]

Right...Moving a thread on economic matters to the Economy sub-forum is soooooooooooo abusive!

Grow the fuck up.

 

[Lakhota]

Right...Moving a thread on economic matters to the Economy sub-forum is soooooooooooo abusive!

Grow the fuck up.

Yes, it is abusive, when you leave other non-politics threads on the Politics board and also regularly neg me. This thread was clearly political.

 

[Mad Scientist]

Paul Krugman

Stopped reading from there.

EDIT: Negged for whining about negs.

 

[CrusaderFrank]

Krugman is the funniest read since Larson stopped The Far Side

 

[Oldstyle]

It's amazing to watch the die hard Keynesian's like Krugman still maintain that we CAN spend our way out of this fiscal hole we've dug for ourselves...one would think that Paul would be embarrassed to show his face after the fiasco that the Obama Stimulus turned into, but he's doubling down on the insanity by calling for more spending on government.

At least Larry Summers and Christina Romer had the good sense to go back to teaching naive college kids when THEIR little Keynesian experiment fizzled. I guess Paul Krugman doesn't have tenure at any Ivy League schools to fall back on? Just "tenure" at the New York Times.

 

[CrusaderFrank]

It's amazing to watch the die hard Keynesian's like Krugman still maintain that we CAN spend our way out of this fiscal hole we've dug for ourselves...one would think that Paul would be embarrassed to show his face after the fiasco that the Obama Stimulus turned into, but he's doubling down on the insanity by calling for more spending on government.

At least Larry Summers and Christina Romer had the good sense to go back to teaching naive college kids when THEIR little Keynesian experiment fizzled. I guess Paul Krugman doesn't have tenure at any Ivy League schools to fall back on? Just "tenure" at the New York Times.

Like Samuelson said we'd be another Depression after WWII ended

 

[CommerceClause]

He is a tenured professor at Princeton and the Stimulus was not going to end the recession. It was $800 billion, much of it in tax cuts divided over two years. Considering that at the time it was enacted the economy was shrinking at 9% a year, just about 2.7% push against a negative 9% drop simply mitigates the downturn. Also, Krugman was being sarcastic when he was speaking about the Housing Bubble, he was pointing out that to get the economy out of Recession, ALL THE FED COULD DO, was create another bubble, because Greenspan ruled out any QE. Krugman then as now was in favor of infrastructure programs to help get the economy back on track. The Bush response to the recession was classically Keynesian: tax cuts and increased Military spending.

 

[CrusaderFrank]

He is a tenured professor at Princeton and the Stimulus was not going to end the recession. It was $800 billion, much of it in tax cuts divided over two years. Considering that at the time it was enacted the economy was shrinking at 9% a year, just about 2.7% push against a negative 9% drop simply mitigates the downturn. Also, Krugman was being sarcastic when he was speaking about the Housing Bubble, he was pointing out that to get the economy out of Recession, ALL THE FED COULD DO, was create another bubble, because Greenspan ruled out any QE. Krugman then as now was in favor of infrastructure programs to help get the economy back on track. The Bush response to the recession was classically Keynesian: tax cuts and increased Military spending.

Solyandra as infrastructure program lol

Obama finally pulled Kenyaisan economics down to the bottom of the abyss where it belongs

 

[Oddball]

Krugman: The Pope of faith-based economics.

 

[CrusaderFrank]

Government Stimulus, this time it'll woik! I swear!

 

[Listening]

Government Stimulus, this time it'll woik! I swear!

If by "work" you mean our credit rating will be completely smashed.....I would believe him.

 

[sealybobo]

By Sahil Kapur

Mitt Romney’s diversity of policy positions over the last decade has left conservatives and liberals wondering: What would he actually do as president? Would he return to his former, more moderate self, or would he embrace the ideological fervor of the right as he did during the primary?

According New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, it’s hardly a close call: A hypothetical President Romney would do pretty much what House Budget Chairman Paul Ryan tells him to do, because he won’t have much of a choice politically. And that, he argues, would be a disaster for the economy.

“Romney — well, who knows what Romney thinks. Romney’s economic advisers are not crazy,” Krugman told TPM in an interview. “But I think it’s unlikely Romney would have the leeway [to break from the Ryan mold].” The presumptive Republican nominee for president has effusively praised Ryan and, during the primary, attacked Newt Gingrich for criticizing him.

The Princeton professor and Nobel Prize-winning economist, who is touring his new book End This Depression Now!, said Romney would be wedded to Ryan’s economic policy prescriptions which have become too entrenched on the right: Above all, massive tax cuts for the rich and draconian spending cuts on programs for the less fortunate, which Krugman argues will amount to an “upward distribution of income plan.”

“You’re never going to get people in the Republican Party accepting the idea that unemployment and food stamps insurance are expansionary,” he said. “That they are actually policies that are good for employment. They’re too wedded to the notion that the undeserving poor … are the cause of unemployment. So I think they’re basically incapable of doing what needs to be done to support this economy.”

The conservative base eagerly wants its president to implement Ryan’s vision, which House Republicans overwhelmingly reaffirmed their support for late March. Anti-tax activist Grover Norquist, arguably the most influential outside figure among modern Republicans, says Romney’s role would be to rubber-stamp Ryan’s agenda.

“We don’t need a president to tell us in what direction to go. We know what direction to go. We want the Ryan budget,” he told New York magazine. “Pick a Republican with enough working digits to handle a pen to become president of the United States.” Of course, the GOP would still have to deal with rebelling Democrats, but a president on board with the broader approach would open up a major opportunity to advance at least parts of Ryan’s vision.

If Romney is elected president, Republicans “certainly will ditch the concern with deficits. They don’t care about deficits at all. Never have,” Krugman added. “But the trouble is they want a combination of policies that, while will on balance expand the deficit, will in fact be bad for the economy even so. Because the programs they really, really want to cut — which is aid to the poor — are the ones that matter for the economy right now.”

Paul Krugman: Electing Romney Is Like Electing Paul Ryan | TPMDC

I think the American middle class understand Romney can not be the President. Doesn't mean the rich won't try.