Without a Paddle

Did Friedrich Hayek, a godfather of Libertarianism, support government supported medical care? Paul Krugman refers to "The Road to Serfdom" where Hayek supports

“a comprehensive system of social insurance” to protect citizens against “the common hazards of life,” and singled out health in particular.

Through Adam Smith's belief in protecting the common good against the sometime evil tendencies of capitalism and you have to wonder what the hell conservatives are talking about!

QOD

The disappearance of unemployment from elite policy discourse and its replacement by deficit panic has been truly remarkable. It’s not a response to public opinion. In a recent CBS News/New York Times poll, 53 percent of the public named the economy and jobs as the most important problem we face, while only 7 percent named the deficit. Nor is it a response to market pressure. Interest rates on U.S. debt remain near historic lows. [emphasis added]

The Lesser Depression, Paul Krugman

Caves of Nerds

Paul Krugman's synopsis on Isaac Asimov's Caves of Steel:

it’s obviously a parable about nerdy Jewish kids from Brooklyn and their feelings of inferiority in the face of blond, athletic, but slightly stupid upper-class WASPs.

Crazy Like a Fox

From Paul Krugman, excerpted here:

Here’s how I see it: At this point, Mr. Bush is looking forward to replaying the political aftermath of Vietnam, in which the right wing eventually achieved a rewriting of history that would have made George Orwell proud, convincing millions of Americans that our soldiers had victory in their grasp but were stabbed in the back by the peaceniks back home.

I have always had the sense that the NeoCons were re-fighting Vietnam. Now they are preparing to complete the cycle. Pray that these men will live out their days and a new generation will not rise up to replace them, bitter and self-righteous, in 40 years.