All that's missing from the Katrina story is an expensive reconstruction effort, with lucrative deals for politically connected companies, that fails to deliver essential services. But give it time - they're working on that, too.That was already true when Krugman said it, though he may not have yet actually known it. But what the hell? How does a guy get to be a big-time pundit saying that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west? We can all do that. And I wouldn't even say something Friedmaniacally idiotic like "the earth is flat," and then delude myself into thinking there's something clever about that, dragging along the best-seller drones in my wake who repeat the same earth-is-flat mantra.
Check this out: In the coming days, perhaps even the full week, Bush will wear lots of workshirts with sleeves that roll up easily and ironed khaki pants, the official uniform of politicos and journalists trying to appear to share the experience of harm of those in real harm's way (who aren't in workshirts and khakis, but rather whatever they managed to salvage). Oh man, am I good at predictions. Now put me in a bowtie and I'll shout at everybody I interview. Better yet, how about spats and a tophat? Bring in some of the New Yorker crowd as a market. Then market me to the hip-hop crowd as the 2006 version of bling-bling, monocle and all. Hire me out to high-society parties where I quote Aristotle, Byron, Kant and Hegel, Emerson, Peirce, Nietzsche, Rilke, Nabokov, Stevens, and help the well-heeled feel like they can think Jack Handley thoughts through their valium and cosmopolitans. Hire me out for the lower crust parties (I'll do this for free) where I quote Lou Reed, Stiv Bators, Mark E. Smith, Andy Gill, and Jeffrey Lee Pierce, and bounce around the living room. Hire me out to the French and German and Chinese and Japanese diplomatic dinner parties where we talk about something other than how to get rich (which hasn't been my experience at such dinner parties -- more like how to remodel the living room of a million-dollar home). Let's talk Tanizaki and Oe, Pascal Bruckner, Peter Handke, blah blah.
Can Krugman do that? Can Friedman? Have they ever heard of any single writer, influential cultural figure, non-establishment figure (apart from Che, of course - like every temporarily rebellious American teenager)? Do they have an inkling of Amartya Sen's genuinely deep reading of not only the tragic faults of economic orthodoxy, but also of the real thoughts of real thinkers, both highly educated and not? I know, I know, Krugman knows his Sen and a hell of a lot of other things. But Friedman is apparently still waiting for the Cliff's Notes.
Here's another prediction: tomorrow the sun will rise and Bush will say the word "tragedy" 34 to 38 times. Place your bets, Krugman. I'll buy the beers if you beat that. And Friedman, you schmuck, quit golfing with world leaders and spend some time on the streets and the world beyond the penthouse. The world is roughly spherical you should know. Your metaphor is stupid, and simply amazing that it has gone best-seller. Plus, India and China are part of Asia, as you might have learned off of the golf course.
So,.. I'm being snarky here. As smart commentator Eric pointed out it's difficult to avoid. But I truly hate that term "snark." It was invented to justify unjustifiable nasty comments about things we don't like or want others to think we're clever not liking. If anyone wants a full-blown philosophical argument for any of the claims I make here, I'll happily provide them, schedule allowing. This is not snark for that reason, and the snarkers of the blogworld can't back that up. Snark is simple "me-no-like-but-me-funny" speak. We should be a smarter world. Not that this admittedly rambling post makes much of an effort in this direction, but let's try to get there for God's sake. Simple predictions about political obviousness don't do us any good, even when they come from the rightly esteemed Paul Krugman and the utterly bafflingly esteemed (to me) Tom Friedman.
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