The New York Times asked four economists- Paul Krugman, Simon Johnson, Brad DeLong and Mark Thoma- to state their opinion on the Geithner Plan. Krugman hates it, Johnson thinks it isn’t enough, DeLong says it is “better than nothing” and Thoma is uncertain. Probably not the best of signs.

Last night, I bought Paul Krugman’s latest book The Return of Depression Economics and the Crisis of 2008. I’m only about a quarter into the book but the writing style is the same as it was in his previous books and in his column and blog: approachable, informative and entertaining. It is a book for those that have a knowledge of politics but a cursory understanding of economics. For economic wonks, it would be more of a light appetizer than a meal but that’s not necessarily a criticism. Krugman states in the forward that he has purposefully toned down the wonk so that it is more readable (but by no means dumbed down) for the general population.

Paul Krugman reported having a spot of trouble the other day:
Unusually, I’m having a vocabulary problem. There has to be some word for the kind of person who considers his mild discomfort the equivalent of torture, crippling injury, or death for other people. But I can’t think of it.
What brings this to mind is this from Alberto Gonzales:
“I consider myself a casualty, one of the many casualties of the war on terror.”
I can certainly understand how such a statement would leave one dumbfounded. However, I’m more than happy to suggest …

Okay, day after Christmas, back at it. Paul Krugman graced us with this in yesterday’s New York Times:
…President-elect Barack Obama, riding a wave of revulsion over what conservatism has wrought, has said that he wants to “make government cool again.”
Before Mr. Obama can make government cool, however, he has to make it good.
True enough, as the last eight years have stripped a lot of the “good” out of government. For inspiration, Krugman looks to the New Deal and the wave of reforms swept in along with it:
How did F.D.R. manage …

Notes from ’round the InterTubes…
Krugman gloats:
Seriously, isn’t it amazing just how impressive the people being named to key positions in the Obama administration seem? Bye-bye hacks and cronies, hello people who actually know what they’re doing.
archcrone begs to differ:
For myself, I had no illusions that I would be writing this post, asking the Obama administration where are the progressives, I just didn’t expect to have to write it this early on. I did expect at least a “token” progressive to be part of the Obama administration, but, apparently progressives aren’t …

Saturday tidbits for the attention-span impaired:

That damn Krugman beat me to it.

Three polls in the space of a week show Obama and McCain neck-and-neck in — wait for it — North Dakota.

Here we go again:

Republican presidential candidate John McCain on Saturday accused Democratic rival Barack Obama of favoring a socialistic economic approach by supporting tax cuts and tax credits McCain says would merely shuffle wealth rather than creating it.
Right now, there are more than a few voters thinking “…and the problem with that is…?”

Why oh why does Sarah Palin hate …

I love it when Nobel Laureates get all gossipy:
There are all sorts of connections between the Nixon administration and the Bush administration. But here’s one I didn’t know about: Hank Paulson was John Ehrlichman’s assistant in 1972 and 1973.
I had no idea either, but I don’t find it even remotely surprising. The last eight years have been nothing but a giant do-over for geriatric Nixon leftovers, as if they were trying to pull off all their Imperial Presidency crap without getting impeached this time.
Sigh. Only a few months left.

Paul Krugman has been awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences today. I am very, very far from being an economist but the economic knowledge I do have has mostly been gained through reading Krugman’s New York Times column and his book The Conscience of a Liberal. What Krugman does as a writer can be undervalued because he does make it look so easy. But it is remarkable how he is able to bridge the gap between economic wonks and the economically uninformed to create a space where both groups …

Things are not looking good for Iceland. Paul Krugman mentioned last week that the country’s government had performed its own bank bailout to the tune of $859 million (adjusted to the small population size, that is equivalent to $850 billion). The government asked for a 75% stake in the equity of that bank in return. But the bailout might not help much in the long run as the beleaguered country sinks into the waves of the global credit crisis. 
Iceland is on the brink of collapse. Inflation and interest rates are …

The economy hit the ground with a thud last week and people stood by with their chalk in hand, ready to draw the outline. But Henry Paulson has an idea. If we give him $700 billion without restrictions, he can fix this. And by “we”, I of course refer to the American taxpayer who had little to no involvement in the extinction of the financial dinosaurs. 
I’m not unfamiliar with economics but that isn’t the same as being knowledgeable. So I’ll turn this over to Paul Krugman: 
There’s justice in the gibes. …