"I don't know how much Glenn Reynolds reads of the stuff he links to. I suspect the answer is 'most'--that he has turned into a guy who never lets the facts get in the way of a bad slur.

"But it is clear...that Reynolds doesn't remember his own archives:

"Instapundit, May 7, 2003:

"'Donald Luskin is stalking Paul Krugman...'

"Instapundit, Yesterday:

"PAUL KRUGMAN'S UNRAVELLING: He's accusing Donald Luskin of being a stalker, in the literal, not figurative sense.

"I believe the actual term is 'critic.'

"It is remarkable--the shift from 'Oh Great! Someone is stalking Paul Krugman!' to 'Paul Krugman has lost his mind--he thinks somebody is stalking him... "

It is remarkable, indeed. It's DeLong who's not reading the stuff he links to. Here's Glenn's response on Instapundit yesterday, where he reveals where his use of the expression "stalking" in that May 7 post really came from.

"BRAD DELONG DEMONSTRATES that he doesn't understand the meaning of the word 'figurative.'

"Here's a helpful illustration of the difference:

"'Literal: Joan didn't want to put her silk blanket in her automatic dryer. Although it was January, she risked putting it on the clothesline. The winter wind gently tossed the lacy blanket.

"'Figurative: Joan looked out into her yard with great excitement. Overnight, a layer of snow had covered the ground. The winter wind gently tossed the lacy blanket.'

"In the second example, you see, there's not an actual lacy blanket, just a bunch of snow. But we use the term because it's evocative and adds color.

"As my comment noted, Paul Krugman is now accusing Donald Luskin of stalking him in the literal, not figurative sense. I, on the other hand, was using the term in a figurative, not literal sense.

"Tune in tomorrow for another episode of 'English 101 for Economics Professors.'

"UPDATE: Justin Katz emails:

"'I propose these examples:

"'Figurative: Glenn Reynolds tore the heart out of Brad DeLong's argument.

"'Literal: Head thuggee Mola Ram tore the heart out of his human sacrifices in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.

"'Context makes it clear that you used "stalking" figuratively, having drawn the term from Luskin's column, which drew it from Krugman's then-figurative slur of "stalker-in-chief." In contrast, Krugman has, as you suggest, now shifted to the literal sense, actually specifying "stalked me personally" in his television appearance.'

"Yes, 'actually stalked me personally' doesn't seem at all figurative to me. But I promise not to 'personally' tear Brad DeLong's heart out in any literal sense.

And really, Temple of Doom? Can't we get an example from one of the good Indiana Jones movies?

"Anti-Semitism with a purpose."

Sounds like some sick satire of Madison Avenue advertising slogans, but it's no joke. It's the sub-headline of Paul Krugman's New York Times column yesterday, in which he rationalizes violently anti-Semitic remarks by Malaysia's prime minister Mahathir Mohamad as symptoms of the failure of the Bush administration's foreign policy.

The column has already generated a storm of protest on the Times' letters page, on the web site of the Anti-Defamation League, and on the web (when you're done here, click for great commentaries by new and old friends Musil, Hogberg, Taranto, Antler, Hinderaker, Henke, DiBenedetto, Wrightson and Sullivan).

But the storm is just getting started. So far nobody has revealed the past ties between Krugman and Mahathir, or pointed out how Krugman appears to have been personally complicit in Mahathir's anti-Semitism. 

First, a quick recap of the column in question. Krugman began by quoting Mahathir's statement last week that "The Europeans killed 6 million Jews out of 12 million. But today the Jews rule this world by proxy. They get others to fight and die for them." Krugman immediately acknowledged the White House's denouncement of Mahathir's statement, and agreed that "Indeed, those remarks were inexcusable."

Inexcusable? Apparently not -- Krugman spends the rest of the column excusing them. Krugman says Mahathir's anti-Semitic statement was

"...calculated — for Mr. Mahathir is a cagey politician, who is neither ignorant nor foolish. ...[Mahathir] is in many ways about as forward-looking a Muslim leader as we're likely to find....So what's with the anti-Semitism? Almost surely it's part of Mr. Mahathir's domestic balancing act, something I learned about the last time he talked like this, during the Asian financial crisis of 1997-98. ...When times are tough, Mr. Mahathir...throws the Muslim majority rhetorical red meat. ...Mr. Mahathir thinks that to cover his domestic flank, he must insert hateful words into a speech..."

Krugman ignores the reality that Mahathir has, according to the Anti-Defamation League, a "long record of anti-Semitism and belief in a Jewish conspiracy to bring about the downfall of Malaysia." And he never cites one word of Mahathir's that would suggest he is even cognizant of US policy. Yet he concludes that Mahathir's statement is motivated by America's "war in Iraq and its unconditional support for Ariel Sharon."

Now let's dig a little deeper. Krugman says that Mahathir's anti-Semitism was "something I learned about the last time he talked like this, during the Asian financial crisis of 1997-98." He elaborates that "At that time...he loudly blamed machinations by Western speculators, and imposed temporary controls on the outflow of capital — a step denounced by all but a handful of Western economists. As it turned out, his economic strategy was right..."

There is a small deception here that will prove to be very significant. As Musil points out, Krugman fails to disclose that he himself was first and foremost among that "handful of Western economists." Remarkable, considering that Krugman normally misses no opportunity to pat himself on the back.

Why isn't Krugman taking credit for the splash he made in September 1998, when he was still the enfant terrible of international trade theory, calling for emergency currency controls in his September 1998 Fortune article called "Saving Asia: It's Time to Get Radical"? Shortly after its publication, Mahathir implemented Krugman's "radical" recommendations. In a Slate article a year later, Krugman bragged that this had become known as the "Krugman-Mahathir strategy." So why the silence now?

Perhaps because Krugman is ashamed of some of things he did and said then. As, it appears, he should be.

In a November 8, 1998 article for, yes, the New York Times Magazine, Krugman wrote an article that dealt with, among other things, the impact of currency speculators in precipitating economic crises of the type that rocked Malaysia in 1997-1998. Once again he writes of Mahathir's anti-Semitism -- but this time, he doesn't say it's "inexcusable." He agrees with it:

"When the occasional accusation of financial conspiracy is heard - when, for example, Malaysia's Prime Minster blames his country's problems on the machinations of Jewish speculators - the reaction of most observers is skepticism, even ridicule.

"But even the paranoid have people out to get them. Little by little, over the past few years, the figure of the evil speculator has reemerged."

And who's the example of the "evil speculator" given in the very next sentence? That's right, George Soros -- a Jew.

My reaction to this is a little stronger than "skepticism, even ridicule." It flat-out makes me sick. And then it gets worse.

According to Krugman's Slate article, he publicly met with Mahathir in Malaysia a year later, and lent his prestige as a prominent international economist to support a leader whom he knew to be anti-Semitic.

"I agreed to spend a day--including a 90-minute 'dialogue' with the prime minister--at the Palace of the Golden Horses, a vaguely Las Vegas-style resort outside Kuala Lumpur. ...In our staged 'dialogue' -- which was played out in semi-public, in front of a disturbingly obsequious audience of a hundred or so businessmen--Mahathir continued to sound a minor-key version of the conspiracy theme, insisting that capital controls were necessary to protect small countries against the evil designs of big speculators."

Krugman admits in the Slate article that he expected the Mahathir government "would try to use me politically--to provide a veneer of respectability to a regime that has lately developed the habit of putting inconvenient people in jail."  The closest thing to an excuse that he offers for agreeing to attend the meeting -- and by so doing, apparently participate in and endorse anti-Semitism and tyranny -- is "I didn't want to go to Malaysia. ...But sometimes an economist has to do what an economist has to do."

Perhaps especially when it involves an opportunity for him to say "I told you so." Back then, Krugman didn't conceal his involvement, and speak of a "handful" of economists calling for currency controls -- he was putting himself right out in front. According to the Slate article, he was "the only high-profile economist to advocate the economic heresy that Malaysia had put into practice." Being adulated by Mahathir before an obsequious audience must have been too big an ego-trip to turn down.

And who paid for Krugman's airfare? His hotel? His meals? Were there perks involved? Was there an honorarium? Was he on Mahathir's "advisory board"? And according to the local press, Krugman was also "speaking at a business conference" at the same time. Was it sponsored wholly or in part by the Malaysian government? Was there an honorarium for that? If the answer is "yes" to any of those questions, it should have been disclosed in yesterday's column.

But that's the least of it. The real issue here is Krugman's apparent acquiescence and participation in anti-Semitism. Will this finally be the issue that forces the New York Times to rein in America's most dangerous liberal pundit?

Posted by Donald L. Luskin at 2:47 AM | link    

Tuesday, October 21, 2003

Posted by Donald L. Luskin at 10:51 PM | link