***(Correcting previous headline. Phil Pilkington, not Yves Smith, is the author of this blog post discussed below.
Phillip Pilkington mentions me a lot in his recent post on the Naked Capitalism blog.
Here is an excerpt:
| Then Mike Norman – a regular guest on various TV shows, including on Fox News – made an even more interesting comment (starting at around 20.30). He tells a story about how he once had David Walker – former Comptroller General and member of the deficit terrorist lobby over at the Peterson Foundation – on his show. While talking with him, Norman got Walker to admit that insolvency is not an issue for US government debt –Walker and his chums, of course, have been pushing the ‘bankruptcy’ argument hard so this was something of a shock to Norman. You can hear Walker quite clearly admit that there’s no solvency issue in this audio clip. |
7 comments:
I thought Yves was a 'her'.
Yves is a her. But I wrote the article -- and I'm a 'he'.
Anyway, best of intentions -- thanks for the link.
Sorry, Phil. I corrected this and pointed out that you are the author.
"Yves is a her. But I wrote the article -- and I'm a 'he'."
Maybe Dr. Tobias Funke was onto something (good comment, nevertheless). :o)
http://www.hulu.com/watch/1049/arrested-development-gay-book-meeting
This article critiques a current theme in society - a growing anti-intellectual populist movement. It seems, more and more people think they can spend 15 minutes on internet sites, or watching tv shows or listening to radio programs, that tend to mostly reinforces their opinions, and they can then credibly challenge experts on subjects that the experts have spent their whole adult lives scholarly studying.
Glad you highlighted Phil Pilkington's article at Yves' blog. I do have a little problem with it. I think that people who say things that they know are not true are plain "lying." There desire to believe in the lie doesn't make it any less of a lie so long as they know that they are not telling the truth.
When Reagan told his story about the welfare queen he knew he was making it up. Maybe with the best intentions. But he was still lying.
In politics today, lying is incessant. But, Democracy requires a modicum of honesty, and our acceptance of lying as business as usual is one of the factors contributing to the evolution of our system from a democracy to a plutocracy. So, the last thing we need is a theory that claims that our liars aren't really lying. They are. And we need to get them fired for that alone.
Advertising and marketing are based on lying. Culturally, we are programmed to accept lying as conventional.
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