Keeping Kool with Krugman, recalling FDR who faced a bigger threat

[ish mailian]

Poor Paul K. has reduced himself to a groin and a jab that takes a low blow
and deflects knee jerks from jerks like Jeb and couterpunches by holding
Bush in the existential threat corner as he ropes the dopes (his readers).

But he makes sense when he explains the economics, how France can bomb
away, how Syria's economy, and therefore, it military, is not even
developing world, and so why call the murdering boys and the people who
exploit them an army, the murders, an existential threat, the struggle, a
war.


The point is not to minimize the horror. It is, instead, to emphasize that
the biggest danger terrorism poses to our society comes not from the direct
harm inflicted, but from the wrong-headed responses it can inspire. And
it’s crucial to realize that there are multiple ways the response can go
wrong.

Well said, Mr. Krugman.

But he makes little sense when he talks of what he calls appeasement. What
exactly is appeasement here?

The problem with Krugman and his ilk is the word terrorism and the word
terrorists. They stick to it like glue, but its useless. So is the word
appeasement.

And that's what happens when you engage people like Jeb and Hilary.

The West can't let the ME alone. Why not? Oil? There is more to it
obviously, but with oil at $40 today, the West is more not less, and as oil
drops further, will be more so, dependent on low cost producers and these
are ME nations.

ISIS is a bit of distraction, really. How do we cut our dependence on low
cost producers of oil, and energy?

GR is, in part, a novel that asks this question. The answer the novel
provides is still relevant.  We don't. Why not?  Not because of the 1%, the
elect, the MIC, but because we can't help ourselves.

On Tue, Nov 17, 2015 at 10:56 AM, Paul Mackin <mackin.paul at gmail.com> wrote:

>
> http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/16/opinion/fearing-fear-itself.html?action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=opinion-c-col-left-region&region=opinion-c-col-left-region&WT.nav=opinion-c-col-left-region&_r=1
> -
> Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?list=pynchon-l
>
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