Normally I don’t bother to read Paul Krugman, for much the same reason I don’t read Bob Novak — dullard political hacks just aren’t that interesting. But I couldn’t help but notice Krugman’s latest, Toward One Party Rule, which was posted on some extreme Left wing e-mail lists I subscribe to. One of these folks, for example, posted a link to this and noted that with the tied it in with the deaths of Sens. Wellstone and Carnihan (murdered by the Republicans, of course).
Like all the best conspiracy theories, Krugman is specific enough to imply a lot, while vague enough to leave a lot of room for whatever interpretation the reader wants to take away. This paragraph, for example, shows a mastery of the conspiracy form,
As a result, campaign finance is only the tip of the iceberg. Next year, George W. Bush will spend two or three times as much money as his opponent; but he will also benefit hugely from the indirect support that corporate interests — very much including media companies — will provide for his political message.
The media’s in cahoots with Bush, but of course Krugman never quite tells us how. In fact, this is so vague that indirect support from media companies could be anything as innocuous as the fact that the media will cover the pointless staged conventions to some nutball theory about Roger Ailes pulling all the strings behind the scenes.
Similarly, Krugman is also very good at introducing plausible deniability into his prose,
Mr. Confessore suggests that we may be heading for a replay of the McKinley era, in which the nation was governed by and for big business. I think he’s actually understating his case: like Mr. DeLay, Republican leaders often talk of “revolution,” and we should take them at their word.
Did he just accuse Republicans of planning a revolution to install a one-party state at the behest of big business? Yes, but the language leaves Krugman plenty of wiggle room to say “oh, I never meant that.”
I’ve read plenty of Lyndon LaRouche screeds on the Internet alleging that Bush plans to install a fascist dictatorship — I just never expected the Times to reprint them.