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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
We economists suffer from the grand delusion that what's good for banana growers must also be good for the efficiency of moral choice. Which of course is prattling nonsense. It's fine to posit the actions and benefits of a GIVEN market but when we GENERALIZE to the whole of society we become yet another hidebound cowardly religion. Friedman's error was in assuming the everything is everything postulate - that what's good for consumers who want to buy electric blenders built by competing companies in different economies must also be good for social engineering generally and that if something goes wrong with a company then it's equally fair for whole populations to suffer as well. It's just another form of blindness.
I heard an interview with Friedman some years back and struck me as a very angry and bitter person. While I don't dispute his intellectual prowess, everything I have read (include the interview) suggests to me that the man was a bully.
It's pathetic that Friedman would be considered a liberal today just because he actually believed in the right to privacy. What does that say about how badly the "party of less government" has actually fallen?
Some people actually BELIEVE that Friedman was somehow "anti-Government" ? Unbelievable. He LOVED Big Government . . . he just said he was for "small government" when "the government" was run by liberals. Like nearly all conservatives, he just wanted to get control of "the government" so as to run other people's lives; the "small government is the best government" was always a ruse with people like him.
he's a moron.
In talking about Friedman, the obits I have read seem to underscore his brilliance as an academician. The pervasive world-wide effects of his "belt-tightening" theories that were translated into policies have been less discussed.
Friedman's theories might have helped fuel the post-soviet decline in Russia and the eastern bloc. Latin America may have Friedman to thank for some of its woes as well.
While the consequeces (good or ill) of specific policies may well be subject to academic debate, I think it wise for Salon to take a position on the subject, and then praise (or vilify) the recently deceased. There is no reason academics should get off the hook for their actions, any more than politicians.
Darren - you are so correct. Big government leads to meat inspection and water quality control and paved roads and minimum wages - but Big Government is BAAAADDDD! Friedman was revered as a god of economics because he told the Right wing wackos what they wanted to hear - that THEY(read "Big Bizness" aka "Multi-national Corporations") should be allowed to rape and pillage and steal the resources of the people of America! And never have to say "Sorry" - or clean up the mess. What a bunch of crap!
How can anyone not see that Friedman was a hack apologist for the rich? He LOVED government when it was busy destroying organized labor and kidnapping, torturing, and killing political opponents in Chile. It was only when it tried to provide public sector employment, guarantee social services and a minimum wage, and manage or regulate important industries that shouldn't be left to the whims of profit-seekers that Friedman was against government.
Anyway, no government, least of all Reagan's or Thatcher's, has ever taken Friedman's ideas seriously: the State plays a huge role in every single modern economy. The only question is whether it makes things nice for multi-billionaires and war profiteers or for ordinary people. Friedman's policies came down in favor of the former every time.
Much of the initial coverage about Fort Hood turned out to be wrong. Is there anything wrong with that?
The accountability imposed by another country for the CIA's kidnapping and torture reveals much about our own.
Fox News' morning show plays to type, talking about whether Muslims in the Army should face "special debriefings"
219 Democrats and one Republican join in favor of the legislation, which passed by a narrow margin
The survivor and author is upset about comparisons some on the right are making to genocide
Salon headlines in your mailbox
