Edward S. Herman
In
his op-ed column of July 23rd entitled "Saints and Profits," Paul
Krugman shows once again why the New York Times put him on as a regular
(for a more extended discussion, see my "Krugman On Economists As Hacks:
Or, ‘Mirror Mirror on the Wall’," Z Magazine, June, 2000). The
editors don’t like Ralph Nader and want him to disappear, and while the paper
denies him access and prevents him from raising serious issues, the editors and
columnists attack him on a regular basis. Krugman has now joined this throng,
and it is almost eerie to see how his performance is increasingly hard to
distinguish from that of Thomas Friedman. Having to write two columns a week,
Krugman has long run out of anything to say based on his own knowledge, and as
he shares Friedman’s glibness, establishment biases, and willingness to misuse
evidence, it would be easy to mistake the one for the other.
In
this anti-Nader tirade Krugman hits a new low, using a number of tired put-downs
and smear tricks, but most importantly making charges against Nader that are,
without a single exception, irresponsible distortions. Before analyzing the
specific charges, let me discuss briefly his smear tricks and his general
analysis of Nader’s alleged evolution from reasonable reformer to anti-corporate
extremist.
On
the smear tactics, Krugman uses several: first, he suggests that Nader, the
purported "saint," suffers from "monomania" and "the
urge to sacrifice the good in pursuit of the perfect. In other words, beware the
cause of the rebel without a life." But Krugman never shows that Nader is
looking for perfection rather than the correction of serious ills, and neither
does he provide any evidence that Nader doesn’t have "a life." Can you
imagine Krugman castigating a hardworking businessman, who spends most of his
waking hours pursuing the bottom line, by suggesting that he is not to be
trusted because he is "without a life"?
Krugman
of course can’t resist mentioning that Nader has assets, just as the Times,
while systematically ignoring Nader’s discussion of real issues, found space for
publicizing that "Nader Reports Big Portfolio In Technology" (June 19,
2000). These assets suggest to Krugman that Nader’s lifestyle "might not be
quite as austere as it seems"–which Krugman makes sound a bit sinister,
but would seem to contradict Krugman explanation of monomania in terms of the
absence of "a life."
More
important, Krugman informs us that more menacing than Nader’s possible vices are
his virtues–"and his determination to impose those virtues on the rest of
us." Krugman does not expand on how this "imposition" is to be
implemented and how it differs from his own policy pitches, or how it compares
with the business community’s lobbying for NAFTA, the WTO, or legislation in
general. At the time of the NAFTA debate, Krugman himself contended that one of
the merits of the agreement was that it would "lock in" Mexico to free
trade. Now there is imposition for you, but as it is something Krugman favors it
is positively desirable. Nader wants laws and institutional changes that Krugman
doesn’t like, so he threatens "imposition." (In a nice touch of
demagoguery, later in his article Krugman notes that Nader says he wouldn’t
rehire Alan Greenspan but would "reeducate" him; which Krugman
mentions presumably because of the connotation of "reeducation camps"
and the Gulag!) A Gore and Bush supporting the military-industrial complex, or
Clinton pushing for NAFTA, aren’t imposing anything; but Ralph Nader threatens
to do so. In short, Krugman descends here to laughable drivel.
Krugman
makes Nader out to be an "extremist" because he has allegedly moved
from his earlier practical reformism and concern for consumers to a
"general hostility toward corporations." An alternative interpretation
is that Nader has broadened and deepened his concerns and analysis; he now sees
more clearly that the corporate system has deep flaws that need to be addressed.
Krugman, on the other hand, considers the corporate system quite sound and the
political system working well. Anybody that disagrees is by definition an
extremist.
Krugman
says that Japan might be better off if it had "shared our healthy distrust
of the claims that what is good for General Motors is good for America."
But Krugman’s "healthy distrust" is nowhere evident in this or other
articles he has offered in the Times. On the trade policies that have
been key issues for him–and on which Nader’s opposition arouses his ire–Krugman
and the GM management see eye to eye and agree that what GM perceives to be good
for itself is "good for America." Furthermore, like GM’s management he
thinks the basic economic structure and existing liberal democracy is quite
sound. So if George W. Bush and Al Gore depend hugely on corporate money and
support all phases of the corporate trade program–and virtually all other
corporate policy demands–they like Krugman are not "extremists" based
on their "general acquiesce in a regime of corporate control," they
are moderates.
Let
me analyse briefly Krugman’s more specific statements about Nader, in the first
two I quote from letters to the New York Times that were refused
publication by the paper:
1.
Nader was against an African trade bill "removing barriers to Africa’s
exports–a move that Africans themselves welcomed" but which Nader opposed
because it would allow multinationals to run local economies into the ground.
Comment: Did all Africans welcome it? Is it not dishonest to fail to note that
the bill had features other than helping African exports, like forcing an
opening of markets and investments and even imposing budget restraints on the
African participants? An unpublished letter by Ms. Njoki Njoroge Njehu, Director
of the 50 Years Is Enough Network, pointed out that the bill was "dubbed
the African recolonization Act by African labor unions and non-governmental
organizations, and was widely opposed by civil society throughout the continent
[she names many of them]. In exchange for meagre trade benefits the AGOA
requires the U.S. president to annually certify that an African nation is
complying with the arduous list of conditions only imposed by the U.S. on
African countries. These conditions include cuts in domestic spending on health
and education and intellectual property rules that would undercut AIDS treatment
and prevention."
2.
Nader "condemned South Africa’s new Constitution, the one that ended
apartheid, because–like the laws of every market economy–it grants
corporations some legal status as individuals." Comment: As an unpublished
letter from South Africa by Patrick Bond, Darlene Miller, and Langa Zita pointed
out, "At our behest, four years ago, Mr. Nader urged revision of a
particular provision only, which grants corporations the same bill of rights
protection as real persons (not just ‘some legal status as individuals,’ as Mr.
Krugman writes). From Mr. Nader, South Africans learned how similar protections
in the United States–not embedded in the U.S. Constitution,
incidentally–undermine efforts to control tobacco advertising and restrict
corporate campaign contributions."
3.
Nader’s organization Public Citizen tried to block introduction of Pfizer’s drug
Feldene, which Krugman found useful in his own case of arthritis, despite the
"firm consensus among medical experts that the drug’s benefits outweighed
its risks." Comment: A letter by Dr. Sidney M. Wolfe, of the Public Citizen
Health Research Group, published on July 27, points out that "Our petition
to the FDA to ban the drug was prompted by eight published studies that compared
the risk of gastrointestinal bleeding, perforation or ulcers from Feldene and as
many as seven other similar drugs. Of drugs available in the U.S., in four of
the eight studies, Feldene had the highest risk of these severe gastrointestinal
adverse effects; in three studies, Feldene had the second highest risk; and in
one study, the third highest risk. Largely because of this widely acknowledged
toxicity, the use of Feldene has fallen to a fraction of what it was earlier.
Since our book, Worst Pills, Best Pills lists many safer, equally effective
alternatives to Feldene, his theory that the ban reflects part of the ‘general
hostility to corporations’ seems especially fatuous…."
4.
After the Columbine school shootings, Nader wrote an article "attributing
these same shootings to–I’m serious–corporate influence." Comment:
Nader’s public statement of April 30, 1999 did not speak of "corporate
influence" in general, it referred to the fact that the commercial
corporate culture that dominates the media, in the search for ever larger
audiences, has featured "ever more blatant displays of violence, sex,
crassness, and nihilism in television, cable, movies, radio, video games and
music." Nader didn’t even mention the gun industry’s efforts to market its
product, which would reinforce the case for "corporate influence." But
what he says about the commercial media’s preference for violence and its
deleterious effects is widely accepted and has been vindicated in research
studies by Dr. George Gerbner and others. Krugman builds his case on a
misleading caricature.
5.
Nader’s and his organizations’ work "seem to have less and less to do with
his original humane goals." Comment: This statement is surely based on the
ignorance of a man who knows Nader has been attacking his precious "free
trade" but can’t be bothered to check out the facts on what he and his
organizations actually do. Readers of Public Citizen and other Nader-related
publications know that the reach of their interests is wider than ever, dealing
with numerous aspects of health, safety and environmental protection, government
as well as corporate accountability, campaign finance reform and civil rights as
well as trade, and that its humane goals remain intact.
What
an establishment spokesperson like Krugman cannot understand is that reaching
humane goals increasingly demands structural changes in the economy and
politics; that although he is prospering as a professional economist and Times
columnist, along with a national elite, for the majority this is not the best of
all possible worlds.