SALON

Friday, Dec 16, 2011 3:30 PM UTC

7. Robert Samuelson

The business columnist can't stop rehashing ancient, discredited Reagan-era dogma

By

Topics: Salon Hack List 2011, Washington Post, Media, Media Criticism,

7. Robert Samuelson

Washington Post columnist Robert Samuelson is an exercise in how often and for how long one can continue repeating the exact same received conservative economic dogma when observable reality contradicts each of your arguments before people begin to stop taking you seriously. (The answer is “always and forever.”)

So. In Samuelson’s telling, the European debt crisis was caused by the welfare state. But internationally, there’s no real correlation between government debt burdens and government spending on social programs. (Like, for example, Germany is doing better than Greece, which has a smaller welfare state.)

According to Samuelson, the American federal government debt will (any minute now!!!!) lead to hyperinflation. This was in November of 2009. We’re all still waiting.

In fact, we should all be more like Latvia, the little country that could … gut its government budget and lay off 29 percent of government workers. That’s Samuelson’s dream, for America. Latvia’s unemployment rate is 20 percent and is not seriously expected to significantly fall any time soon.

Samuelson, a former business desk reporter who I am pretty sure is taken seriously on economic issues because people think he’s related to the late Paul Samuelson, is never hysterical or bigoted or racist or any of the myriad awful things that so many others on this list are. He’s just constantly, consistently wrong, because he believes in a series of stupid Reagan-era myths, like “Johnson’s economic policies caused stagflation” and “super rich people are in fact hard-working small business owning job creating Regular Americans.”

The last decade has repeatedly and gratuitously made Samuelson’s entire political philosophy look ridiculous. Instead of ever changing his tune, though, it’s the exact same bullshit, over and over again.

HACKIEST 2011 MOMENT:
When the relentless deficit hawk argued that we mustn’t ever cut a single dime of spending on the armed forces.
- – - – - – - – - -
(Read the introduction here. Read the 2010 Salon Hack 30 List here.)

Alex Pareene

Alex Pareene writes about politics for Salon and is the author of "The Rude Guide to Mitt." Email him at apareene@salon.com and follow him on Twitter @pareene More Alex Pareene.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 9 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

The Salon Hack List is our annual countdown of our least favorite media personalities, ranked (very roughly) in order of awfulness. This is our 2011 list. 2010's Hack Thirty is here.

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

vote
Oklahoma senator: Tornado aid “totally different” from Sandy aid
3033 points3034 points | 2192 comments
vote
Anyone Regret Slashing National Weather Service Budget Now?: With GOP-backed cuts to forecasting agency, experts warn future storms will go undetected and more lives lost
979 points980 points | 515 comments
vote
Oklahoma senator wants to offset tornado aid with other cuts
146 points147 points | 55 comments
vote
Horrifying new trend: Posting rapes to Facebook " In Chicago this weekend, prosecutors announced three teenaged boys will tried as adults for aggravated criminal sexual assault after allegedly raping a 12-year-old girl — and posting a video of the attack on Facebook."
28 points29 points | 15 comments
vote
New campaign compares gun control to anti-LGBT discrimination
26 points27 points | 10 comments

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: So long, Sookie Stackhouse

Recommendations