Stephen Moore, the head of the Club for Growth, and regular columnist for National Review Online, wrote a piece for NRO attacking the proposed appointment of Gregory Mankiw, a very bright economist at Harvard, as chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors. Moore's primary point strikes me as accurate. Mankiw is on the record attacking, in fairly vituperative terms, the supply-siders of the 1980s. The Council's job includes not merely giving advice, it involves selling policy. Mankiw, says Moore, is not going to be effective selling tax cuts after attacking supply siders. Every time he testifies before Congress, someone is going to pull out his textbook and lecture to reporters from it. Now, I should note that Moore's piece was obviously written quickly and was badly edited. For example, although Moore mentions Mankiw's text Macroeconomics, an intermediate text, the link is to Mankiw's introductory text. And a second error, more on which in a minute.
Well, then the flack flew. Jason Soon had a fit because, well, Mankiw is very smart, and he should not have to toe the partisan line on every issue, and Soon seems to think that ends the matter. To which the only response has to be, roughly, get real, kid. We are not talking about Mankiw views on abortion, or cloning, or education vouchers. We are talking tax cuts, a major Bush policy initiative. Setting the tone of the discussion, Soon calls Moore dishonest.
Then John Quiggin, an economist at the University of Queensland, picks up on Soon's post, and has a fit as well. He notices Moore's penultimate paragraph:
The good news is there are a multitude of brilliant supply-side academics who would be superb chief economists at the White House. I am thinking of talented people like Brian Wesbury of Chicago, Richard Vedder of Ohio University, and David Malpass of Bear Stearns.
This is the big error I mentioned above. Moore says "academics" but only one of the three is an academic. As to whether it is an honest or dishonest mistake, I do not know. But not Quiggin, who apparently thinks he is the Shadow (Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men? The Shadow knows!), who knows it is a dishonest error. Moore says "Brian Wesbury of Chicago" which pretty much implies, in the academic business, that Wesbury is at the University of Chicago. Wesbury is actually at Griffin, Kubik, Stephens, and Thompson, a Chicago-based investment bank. That neither Moore, nor NRO's editor, spotted this has me annoyed, to put it mildly, and they should run a correction. But Quiggin, who knows that the error is the result of dishonesty, then goes off to make his own errors, plus an oddity. He says of Malpass:
A short Google search reveals all. Not only is David Malpass not an academic, he doesn't hold an economics qualification of any kind (he has an undergraduate physics degree and an MBA), though this hasn't stopped him becoming chief economist at Bear Stearns.
This is the oddity part. Moore says upfront that Malpass is at Bear Stearns, a major securities firm. I can fall asleep reading the business section, and I have heard of Bear Stearns. Obviously, Moore is making a mistake, but it is pretty sloppy dishonesty that actually mentions that Malpass works at one of the leading securities firms. So why does Quiggin need Google to discover that Bear Stearns is not a university. Now to the error part. Moore correctly notes that Richard Vedder is at Ohio University. Quiggin says Ohio University is a private university. In fact, it is a state university, as a quick Google search could have confirmed for Quiggin. More seriously, Quiggin makes a bizarre accusation.
Chicago is one of the top economics departments in the US (or the world, for that matter) and Ohio State is certainly respectable. But why not say "University of Chicago" and "Ohio State University."
Nowhere does Moore say anything about Ohio State. The Ohio State reference comes wholly out of Quiggin's imagination. Or was Quiggin being dishonest here? Since he can read other people's minds, I will let him decide that for himself.
Then of course Brad DeLong, who also likes to fling around the dishonesty charge, jumps into the fray. Like Quiggin, he says nothing about the substance of Moore's column, and leaps on that paragraph.
So why does this guy Stephen Moore try to make the readers of National Review think that David Wesbury teaches at the University of Chicago (for that's what saying that an "academic" is "of Chicago" means)? Why, in fact, does Stephen Moore try to make the readers of National Review think that David Malpass is an academic?
DeLong says that Moore is trying to mislead National Review readers about Wesbury and Malpass. Like Quiggin, DeLong is also the Shadow, who knows the difference between mistakes and dishonesty. The Wesbury reference is extremely misleading, but why is DeLong so ideologically blinded that he does not seem to notice that Moore says that Malpass is at Bear Stearns. An inept paragraph, but an even more inept attempt at dishonesty, no? As to Quiggin's clearly accusation against Moore, DeLong, the scourge of the dishonest, has not a word to say. Did DeLong miss it, or is he being dishonest here?
NRO and Moore ought to issue a correction, and fast. But Quiggin ought to admit to own mistake, and fast, and DeLong ought to admit to his one-sidedness in the dishonesty charges, and fast. And both Quiggin and DeLong ought to remember that throwing around charges of dishonesty can be a very dangerous game to play.
Posted by sjostrom on March 01, 2003 04:39 PM
Comments:
The fundamental dishonesty in Moore's piece is his claim that there are large numbers of 'brilliant academics' who would meet his litmus test for appointment. If this were true, the fact that his article was a rush job would not stop him naming them.
Posted by: John Quiggin on March 1, 2003 09:42 PM [Permalink]
Is this a joke?
Are you seriously saying that you believe Moore may have just made a mistake?
Have you never read anything from him?
I mean, come on.
Naivete has its limits.
Posted by: GT on March 2, 2003 04:01 AM [Permalink]
