But everybody knows heat is transferred by caloric – only a few diehards believe that silly energy theory.

“Do we really need a book on this?”

Yes, in the same way that the world needs “Mein Kampf” and “Das Kapital.” We need it so that when future generations wonder where things went wrong, they can read works that lets them see what insane ideas the leaders of the time believed and the path they chose.

100 years from now, I hope than when the next nitwit in charge comes up with the idea that you can just print and borrow your way to riches, someone will pull out a copy, wave it around, and say: “We’ve already been down that road and we all saw where that lead!”

Since at least the late 1920s, worldwide economic policy and mass opinion have been driven largely by one form or another of Keynesian economics. For someone to deny this involves either ignorance, an inability to grasp reality, or a willful lack of honesty.

“Today’s financial crisis has led to a widespread lack of confidence in the laissez faire style of economic policy.”

Well, that’s about all we need to know about this book.

John, one of the rights of the market is to complain about its excesses.

Lawrence, I hope that in a hundred years they’ll finally start fixing English spelling to get rid of homographs(read, lead, record, etc).

BioTube, that was not a problem with a homograph being there, it was a problem with someone imagining there was one. Getting rid of homographs wouldn’t fix it, as the screw up comes from inventing one.

“The Keynes Solution”
We should trademark this name for an enema!

I agree with both John Boyle’s statement and Jeffrey Tucker’s sentiment. It drives me crazy when people say, “Just what we need, another fill-in-the-blank.” I’ve heard this statement in reference to Chinese restaurants and even golf courses at Pebble Beach. But, of course, Mr. Tucker’s statement is hardly anti-capitalistic, but merely an outgrowth of the frustration of seeing decades (going on a century) of error finding a market, while even the so-called capitalists that we see in the media do not mention ABCT, von Mises or Hayek. The knowledge is there – how long will it be before the world drinks of it?

Yes as a matter of fact we do need a another book on this. As LvM pointed out, every so often it is necessary to dress up the old fallacies in new rhetoric.

There are probably people who believe the earth is flat and is the center of the universe. This fits in that category.

Here is a classic example from today’s headlines of disguising an ancient pile of horsesh&t with new euphemisms.

Give Central Bankers More Room to End Stability Threats: Carney

Jason McIntyre
Saturday, August 22, 2009

The Bank of Canada governor is giving broad hints that he wants an expanded mandate to prevent future fiscal meltdowns.

Saturday, in front of key global policy makers in Wyoming, Mark Carney expressed his views on the current economic crisis.

Carney believes central bankers should be given the freedom to use monetary policy to rein in financial markets.

His agreement with the federal government is restricted to controlling inflation.

That deal – to maintaining a strict two per cent target – expires in 2011.

Now more than ever we need books like “The Keynes Solution”.

P.S. for those who need to be brought up to speed on Canadian monetary policy:

Before joining the public service, Carney had a thirteen-year career with Goldman Sachs in its London, Tokyo, New York and Toronto offices. His progressively senior positions included co-head of sovereign risk; executive director, emerging debt capital markets; and managing director, investment banking. He worked on South Africa’s post-apartheid venture into international bond markets, and was heavily involved in Goldman Sachs’s work with the 1998 Russian financial crisis.

jc butte,

I cannot agree more. For those who cannot find it, the title of the appendix is:
“Why Keynes’s Ideas Were Never Taught in American Universities”

Are we sure this writer isn’t also a “journalist” for theonion.com?