Post-Iowa Notes by Paul Krugman

Post-Iowa Notes by Paul Krugman:

Wissai's Introduction:

Krugman is a Nobel Prize Winner in Economics but unsurprisingly very fond of writing about Politics. Karl Marx's enduring contribution to human knowledge was to establish a connection between Politics and Economics. Marx maintained that the dialectic of history stemmed from the changes in economic relationships. These economic relationships influenced the way people think and act. Man is an Economic Human Being (Homo Economicus), hence Homo Politicus. Your politics derives largely from your pocket book, especially if you are a card-carrying member of the Republican Party in the U.S.

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Essay by Krugman:

Well, in my pre-Iowa notes I called the Republican primary right:

I know what will happen on the Republican side: someone horrifying will come in first, and someone horrifying will come in second. 

Let me add that someone horrifying also came in third. Marco Rubio may seem less radical than Cruz or Trump, but his substantive policy positions are for incredibly hawkish foreign policy, wildly regressive tax policy, kicking tens of millions of people off health insurance, and destroying the environment. Other than that, he’s a moderate.

On the Democratic side, I was glad to see Nate Cohn, who’s a professional here, reach the same conclusions I got in my amateur analysis: this still looks like Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination.

The point is not just that she eked out a very narrow win in Iowa, which is important mainly for limiting the doomsaying spin the media were so eager to deliver. It is that this situation doesn’t look at all like 2008.

People tend to forget that the 2008 primary was quite close all the way through; Clinton actually got more votes than Obama, but lost the delegate count through careless organization that won’t be repeated. And the crucial role of Iowa there was that it persuaded African-American voters to switch en masse. It’s hard to see that happening this time.

That said, Sanders is tapping into something that moves a lot of Democrats, and which Clinton needs to try for as well. Can she?

Certainly taking a harder line on the corruption of our politics by big money is important — and no, giving some paid speeches doesn’t disqualify her from making that case. (Cue furious attack from the Bernie bros.) Substantively, her financial reform ideas are as tough as his, just different in focus. What is true, though, is that simply by having been in the world of movers and shakers for so long, Clinton can’t project the kind of purity that someone who has been an outsider (even while sitting in the Senate) can manage.

The bigger problem, though, to my mind at least, is the ability to deliver a message of dramatic uplift, the promise that electing your favorite candidate will cause a dramatic change in the world. How do you do that if your reality sense tells you that only incremental progress is possible, at least for now? You probably can’t. (I’m pretty bad at the uplift thing myself). To be blunt, I think Sanders is selling an illusion, but it’s an illusion many people want to believe in, and there’s no easy way to counter that.

In the end, again, Clinton’s tell-it-like-it-is approach will probably be enough to clinch the nomination. And then she’ll be in a very different position, running as the champion of real if limited progress against, well, look at those top three on the other side.

Wissai