As one who has read Krugman for years and generally respects his judgment, I have felt torn about his almost irrationally harsh criticism of Barack Obama. I chalked his views up to everything from passionate and honest differences to self interest. Now, thanks to Jonathan Alter’s latest piece in Newsweek, it is possible that Krugman is simply wrong because he is basing his arguments on incorrect "facts."
Alter sets the stage by noting that:
Krugman calls Obama "naïve" and an "anti-change candidate" because he favors bringing all of the players in the health care debate around a "big table" and rejects the populist message of John Edwards, who is apparently Krugman's choice for president. "Anyone who thinks the next president can achieve real change without bitter confrontation is living in a fantasy world," Krugman writes, endorsing Edwards's view that the insurance and drug industries should be excluded from any talks on health care reform because they stand to lose profits.
I disagree with Krugman's argument that nothing can be accomplished without "bitter confrontation." Nor does it make sense that one can reform a system by holding secret meetings and then commanding change. This is a prescription for stalling healthcare reform indefinitely, again.
Obama's idea is a better one: Get every special interest out in the open on television, where the new president can cross-examine them and expose their phony rationalizations for charging $100 a pill or denying coverage to sick people (and Edwards, the former trial attorney, would be especially good at this). Then, having triumphed over the drug and insurance companies in the court of public opinion, the legislative victories will follow. It is, indeed, a fantasy to think these interests will roll over entirely, but they will get a much worse deal.
Obama has forged his career in finding points of agreement and coming to a consensus to accomplish goals that many thought impossible given political circumstance, e.g. ethics reform, death penalty reform. Alter then notes that Krugman,
The columnist and his candidate both believe that Franklin D. Roosevelt succeeded by being a polarizing figure. I studied FDR for four years while writing a book about him, and this is simply untrue. It's also untrue of other successful Democratic presidents and for a simple reason: "Bitter confrontation" simply doesn't work in policy-making.
Alter also describes how after FDR's re-election he attempted to pack the courts out of spite, this and an effort to "purge" the opposition led to a far less successful second term.
Krugman is a polulist as are many here, but for populism to succeed, pragmatism needs to be integrated into the mix. Alter points out that Krugman is wrong when he states that for Obama to win, he needs to run as a populist. Wrong because a true populist has never been elected before.
Finally,
To call Obama "anti-change," as Paul Krugman does, is anti-common sense. Leadership requires a mixture of confrontation and compromise, with room for the losers to save face. "They have to feel the heat to see the light," LBJ liked to say. That heat is best applied up close. In public. Across the big table.