CNN/Fortune quotes Higgs and others on how the New Deal prolonged the depression.
But then the journalist–displaying the ever-annoying habit of ignorant reporters who have to pretend to be omniscient–concludes that the debate over the New Deal has evidence running in all directions.
And so: “As usual the truth lies somewhere in the middle. The biggest thing we have in common, perhaps, is that like Roosevelt, we can only take our best guess at what will work. And hopefully, the cure this time will take hold faster.”
Yes, it is just a dumb line that ill-read reporters toss off as a way of pleasing editors and otherwise don’t know how to end an article. Still, it is egregiously irresponsible. It contributes to the building of Leviathan. I know we are supposed to be happy that the reporter bothered to report the other side but somehow it always happens this way: they land on the side of the state.
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As usual the truth lies somewhere in the middle.
I hate that sentence. With a passion. It is so completely ignorant, in all fields: economics, religion, politics, science, …
And as you say, it always winds up on the side of the state. Not “in the middle” at all.
“Now where should I thrust this sword? Somewhere to the right? To the left? Ah! Right down the middle.”
As the great man said, “Every intervention will not produce the result desired, and will lead directly to the next intervention.” That is what is so disgusting about “choosing the middle way” – the fact that there is no middle way. There is only interventionism, and non-interventionism, and with every intervention the State wins.
If they can even get the program started before the economy recovers. Look how the managers of FEMA come to rescue the economy: “Maybe too Little Always too Late” http://www.reason.com/blog/show/131636.html
jdavidb, couldn’t agree with you more. You say 2+2=4; I say 2+2=5. “As usual. . .”
“we can only take our best guess at what will work”
So he admits it’s just a guess…but you just know they’ll call anybody who disagrees with Obama’s guess an unpatriotic obstructionist.
The problem with the “best guesses” of bureaucratic hacks is that they tend to doom so many people into war or economic turmoil.
I watched Michael Pento on CNBC this morning absolutely floor everyone with his statements about the destructive inflationary nature of the “stimulus package” ending in the claim that this was going to destroy the economy.
His recommendations? Let the system fail in order to heal, and invest in precious metals.
Other than Peter Schiff, this is the best thing I’ve seen on CNBC in quite a while.
http://www.cnbc.com/id/15840232?video=1031368277
Ugh. Articles like this are what makes it so hard to follow the mainstream press. Rather than actually trying to get to the bottom of anything let’s just pretend both sides make good arguments and give everyone a stimulus trophy.
Yep,
Saw that article yesterday and was just bracing myself as I decided to read on. Wish I could add something more, but I had a similar reaction upon finishing the piece (of…).
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Yes, I saw that this morning. The other guest was almost speechless.
Marc Faber and Jim Rogers are frequently on the Asian and European shows on CNBC overnight. They are holding up the Austrian view for that audience.
“The truth is somewhere in the middle” reflects two types of thinking. One is the simple fact that the writer desperately wants to believe in the New Deal, as most journalists do, and in the omnipotences and omniscience of their government. Rather than accept the truth and admit their error, they would rather escape by confusing the reader with the smoke the can generate by pretending the opposition has an equally good argument. Rejecting the truth because the consequences threaten their world view, they become agnostics and pretend that all sophisticated and intellectual people are agnostics, too.
The second way of thinking that this response reflects is anti-reason, anti-truth philosophical nonsense. Reason is just a tool of the elite, not a tool for arriving at truth. And real truth doesn’t exist; at least, if it does, we can’t know it. So the cool thing to do is not take sides but to split the difference and try to achieve a consensus. Few people in economics claim to have the truth; they always appeal to the consensus opinion as if consensus is a substitute for thinking, reason and truth and those outside the consensus are extremists we don’t need to concern ourselves with.
Funny…..there is no comment section on this article. Maybe if there was, this wouldn’t be such a guess & pray situation.
If I were to meet that reporter, I would ask him to kiss my derrière. Not on the left, or the right, but where he believes the truth lies,,,
“…they always appeal to the consensus opinion as if consensus is a substitute for thinking,…”
I plan to slightly reconfigure this into: “consensus is not a substitute for thinking” and use it whenever possible. Well said Fundy.
To summarize article in one paragraph:
Oh boy! Some crazy capitalist fundie cooks think that the New Deal policy didn’t help the Depression, unlike what the textbooks say. But more reasonable economists of course contend that while the New Deal wasn’t perfect, it was still the only effective course of action at the time, bringing results after a near decade of failure. To conclude, we think that taking the middle ground would be the best course of action to satisfy both views. Now let’s slice the infant in half and give each mother a pair!
“As usual the truth lies somewhere in the middle.â€
I am not especially educated in logic or philosophy, but this statement is nothing but an assertion that is not supported by logic or empirical evidence. Thus, the statement is incorrect, and was made to force the desired conclusion that New Deal type policies are needed.
As the lady once said…
“In any compromise between good and evil… it is only evil that profits…”
To acknowledge the other side and then conclude thus demonstrates such a lack of understanding of ‘the other side’ as to make meaningless its utterance. The only point in stating it is to be able then to say ‘See! I am an objective, responsible journalist… I showed both sides of the issue.’
Conclusion to the contrary notwithstanding.
i see youu
Like most of today’s mainstream reporters they park their brains somewhere and begin typing. I don’t think that if they were really honest their default, “as usual the truth lies somewhere in the middle,” comment is not what they personally believe and therein lies the real problem, the presupposition that, and regardless of the facts, free-markets don’t really work. Most of these guys are not economists and are not really interested in learning anything from history or doing the hard work of looking at the evidence (see, “Great Myths of the Great Depression” available at http://www.fee.org).
BTW, how can anyone say we need to “make our best guess” about what will work? With what is at stake we need to do more that make our “best guess.” As a side line, one of the reasons the markets continue to drop is the uncertainty that is being projected by the Obama administration as to what their “best guess” is. The administration is completely walking around in the dark about what will work…they simply don’t know. What really matters to them is expanding the control of the federal government and securing power for their party and politicians.
My cynical belief is, most are lazy, not independent thinkers and most are products of as educational system that promoted socialism and criticized free-market economics.
Forget mainstream media…welcome to the blog-o-sphere, where truth will reach the masses.
The real TRUTH almost never lies “somewhere in the middle.” What lies in the middle is compromise. Genuine TRUTH is TRUTH for a reason — it is, by its very nature UNCOMPROMISING.
From my own contact with reporters, I have to say that they are tradesmen, just like plumbers, and will cut corners when facing a deadline or dead end. They usually lack a wide liberal arts education (although they’ve been to college) and know nothing about their topic, and they care nothing. They’re just trying to get the job done and go home. If they don’t have a fact and they’re stymied, they either fabricate one or weasel their way to a concluding sentence.
At least in the States your news broadcasters recognise that there is a pluarality of opinion on this topic amongst economists. In the UK the BBC just assumes away all opposition to the Keynesian approach to our problems on the understanding that only the main Opposition Party (i.e., the Conservative Party (CP)) disagrees with it and that all economists otherwise support it. (That said the CP’s position is probably Keynsian aswell in many respects).
With the exception of a couple of recent interviews with Jim Rogers, radicals like Schiff never seem to get interviewed in the UK and Rogers was only interviewed because he delcared sterling to be a dead duck as a currency. And when an English monetarist (Tim Congdon) was on BBC Radio 4 the other day calling into question PM Brown’s strategy re the banking crisis he was effectively shouted down by the Radio 4 presenter who seemed to be unwilling to accept an opinion dissenting from the prevailing Keynesian orthodoxy.
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