Posted on 08/09/2004 8:20:40 AM PDT by xsysmgr
There could only have been two possible outcomes when the arch-shockpundits of the Left and Right, Paul Krugman and Bill O'Reilly, met on Tim Russerts CNBC show for a televised showdown. It was either going to be The Beatles, or Quentin Tarantino Paul is dead, or Kill Bill.
Im happy to report it was the former. Bill OReilly didnt just win the debate. He cut out Paul Krugmans heart and stomped on it. Welcome, Bill OReilly, to the Krugman Truth Squad.
This marks the first time that anyone has really stood up to Americas most dangerous liberal pundit on television. And Krugman simply didnt know how to handle it. At several points in the show Krugman was practically in shock, with hands visibly trembling.
OReilly was masterful. He didnt for one moment grant Krugman the undeserved respect that everyone else grants him, thanks to the prestigious aura of his Princeton professorship and his New York Times column. And OReilly didnt let Krugman get away with any of his usual stunts.
OReilly uncompromisingly held Krugman to account for some of the outrageous (and outrageously wrong) things Krugmans written in his Times columns. In one case, when Krugman denied what OReilly accused him of having said, OReilly jabbed his index finger toward Krugmans face and shouted, Dont call me a liar, pal. Thats what you do all the time, and Im not going to sit here and take it.
OReilly had reminded Krugman of his repeated predictions of economic catastrophe as the result of President Bushs tax cuts a catastrophe that, obviously, hasnt materialized, and which Krugman now denies having predicted. Heres part of the exchange:
O'Reilly: ... Mr. Krugman was dead 100 percent wrong in his columns, uh, two years ago when he said the Bush tax cuts would lead to a deeper recession. You can read his book and see how wrong he was.
Krugman: Actually, you can read it. I never said that. I said it would lead to lousy job creation.
OReilly: Column after column after column. You made the point, in your book, okay, that these cuts, these tax cuts were going to be disastrous for the economy.
Krugman: Nope ...
O'Reilly: They havent been.
Krugman: Uh, uh, Im sorry. Thats a lie. Let me just say, thats a lie.
OReilly: Its not a lie.
Krugman: Its a lie.
Krugmans the liar, not OReilly. Its just too bad OReilly didnt have a quotation at hand to prove it. Among dozens of possible examples, Krugman wrote in his April 22, 2003, New York Times column that
Aside from their cruelty and their adverse effect on the quality of life, these cuts will be a major drag on the national economy. its clear that the administrations tax-cut obsession isnt just busting the budget; its also indirectly destroying jobs by preventing any rational response to a weak economy.
OReilly followed up by cleverly asking Krugman since Krugman was claiming not to have predicted a deeper recession after the tax cuts whether he instead predicted the economic growth of the last year? Krugman was so flustered no doubt knowing he was checkmated that he stammered out this remarkable confession:
Compare me compare me, uh, with anyone else, and I think youll see that my forecasting record is not great.
You can be sure well be quoting that one again and again! On this one matter, we most heartily agree.
What was most impressive about OReillys performance in the debate is that he was genuinely not partisan. In fact, he often took positions that were conciliatory to Krugman with respect to heated partisan issues. As but one example among several, he offered freely that the Iraq war was a big screw-up. But over and over, he shamed Krugman by rubbing his face in the exaggerated and partisan way that he and others in the liberal press handle these issues.
Faced with an opponent who was on the one hand so conciliatory, and on the other hand so aggressive, Krugman could do little more than throw out feeble ripostes or roll over and change the subject. At one point OReilly faulted Krugman for appearing in public with the likes of Al Franken:
O'Reilly: The war on terror may not have been best served by the Iraq adventure. Thats a legitimate debate. What I object to is the lying charges, the slander and defamation that comes out of the Krugman wing if you want to call it of the social landscape. [Krugman shakes his head and smiles.] Dont give me that! Who are you appearing with today, in your book signing? You're appearing with Stewart Smalley [the Saturday Night Live role played by Franken], the biggest character assassinator in the country.
Krugman: The guy you compared to Goebbels?
OReilly: You are in with the most vile form of defamation in this country. You are pandering to it. And I resent it, sir.
Krugman: We resent you, too.
OReilly: Yeah, I know you do. And you know what youll do about the resentment? Youll lie about me and attack me personally. Thats what youll do.
Krugman: Lets watch that, okay?
When OReilly blasted Krugman for the New York Timess excessive and repetitious coverage of the horrors of Abu Ghraib and the absence of stories on the United Nations oil-for-food scandal Krugman couldnt even manage to mouth his usual brown-nosing platitudes about how bend-over-backwards even-handed the Times is:
I think if you look, well Im, Im not gonna, you know Im not here to, to defend the New York Times, which has nothing to do with what I write in the column. Alright? So I dont want to get into this one.
Starting the last segment of the show, Krugman tried to take the offensive what was clearly a prepared gotcha, relying on written notes hed held in front of him during the whole program. Having discussed Michael Moore and his film, Fahrenheit 9-11, in the previous segment, Krugman looked furtively at Russert like a little boy about to play a nasty prank, and said,
Actually I just want to say a word about Fahrenheit 9-11, uh, just to talk a little bit about Bill OReillys credibility on this. Uh, uh, Bill has said on-air that, uh, Michael Moore believes we are an evil country, and if you saw the film you know thats not true. And, uh, actually, he denied in the same program that you said what you just said, but anyways I just think thats a little something to look at in terms of the credibility.
If the sheer feebleness and inarticulateness of that attack leaves you wondering what Krugman was trying to accomplish, let me explain. As hard as it is to believe, apparently Krugmans admiration for Moore and his film is so deep that, in his mind, OReillys saying Moore called America evil is enough to impugn OReillys credibility. Krugman says, I think there were a lot of things in that film that showed that this is a guy who really does love his country. And he loves the working people of America.
Whatever you may think of the film, all OReilly had done on his radio show was accurately quote Moore speaking of this country of mine, which is known for bringing sadness and misery to places around the globe. That statement was first reported in a fawningly pro-Moore article in The New Yorker last February, and was repeated two days before OReillys show by conservative New York Times op-ed columnist David Brooks.
Not exactly Watergate, is it? But it was the best the flustered Krugman could do, though it ended up leading him into an OReilly trap. The trap revealed what I consider to be Krugmans worst vice the way he recycles propaganda and rumors from leftist gossip sites, giving them the imprimatur of the New York Times. In this case, it was Media Matters, the website run by confessed liar David Brock (and backed by millionaire George Soros).
O'Reilly: And where did you get that little evil quote, by the way. You dont listen to The Radio Factor [O'Reillys radio show.]
Krugman: No, but they have video clips. They have, they have the clips.
OReilly: Well who gave it to you?
Krugman: Yeah, it was Media Matters.
O'Reilly: [Booming] Media Matters! Oh, I see! A real objective website.
Krugman: Hey, wait a second, sir
O'Reilly: Hey, Mr. Propaganda, you ought to take and do your own research, pal, and stop taking that left-wing garbage, throwing it out there for the folks.
Krugman: What have I said that was false?
OReilly: Do your own research!
Krugman: It helps me
Looks to me like Americas most dangerous liberal pundit learned a couple valuable lessons this past Saturday. For one thing, he learned that its a lot easier to call people liars, lie about your own past statements, and spread partisan innuendo from the secure redoubt of the op-ed page of the New York Times, where the only feedback you get is the hand-picked atta-boys published on the Timess letters page. Maybe he learned that you cant get away with that stuff when theres a living, breathing opponent across the table from you someone like Bill OReilly, whos not afraid to fight back.
And could it be, just possibly, that Krugman has finally learned a little something about humility?
Donald Luskin is chief investment officer of Trend Macrolytics LLC, an independent economics and investment-research firm. He welcomes your comments at don@trendmacro.com.
Is the video of this anywhere on the Internet?
THAT expression is worth a thousand sound bites!
I saw this show, and O'Reilly overwhelmed Krugman, in every way, even physical size. Krugman came across as a little smug guy. O'Reilly was all over him.
Sounds like O'Reilly was really fired up and well prepared for his debate. Too bad it happened on NBC. On FNC it seems like he is being subdued to the point of wishy-washiness in an effort to be "fair and balanced." I would rather see him unleased, even if I don't agree with him all the time.
O'Reilly is going to show it tonight. This is MustSeeTV. Krugman looked like a cornered rat! Hands shaking, playing with his sleeves, neck sunk into his shoulders... Priceless.
He also lied about the recount. His only paper has this article online still:
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/11/12/politics/12VOTE.html?ex=1092024000&en=229190b739e4163a&ei=5070
Study of Disputed Florida Ballots Finds Justices Did Not Cast the Deciding Vote
November 12, 2001
A comprehensive review of the uncounted Florida ballots from last year's presidential election reveals that George W. Bush would have won even if the United States Supreme Court had allowed the statewide manual recount of the votes that the Florida Supreme Court had ordered to go forward.
Having watched this I would say Krugman was scared silly or he has Parkinsons because his hands were shaking like mad and he had to grab them to stop the very noticable shaking.
Krugman is nasty, vicious liberal who lives in a very sheltered NY liberal world. I doubt he has been in any situtation or setting where his views have been challenged.
That's the problem. Krugman came across as a little smug guy at the beginning of the interview, he stayed that way throughout the interview and he left holding the same belief.
We really have two Americas, as John Edwards says, and we're talking past one-another. Someone else said that on a left-wing forum the threads read like Krugman whipped O'Reilley, and I'm sure that they believe that he did.
Mr Potato Head was so flummoxed by the exchange it looked like his eyes were going to bug right out of their sockets.
I'll be watching O'Reilly tonight.
He is one of the few who seem to understand that to soundly beat someone rhetorically, you have to hang them with their own words and their own principles.
You have to make it obvious to them that they are full of crap based on their own criteria. They will still deny it, but everyone watching and participating will know what's going on.
I know O'Reilly can go all over the map on his positions, but I would rather see him debate insted than some grinning chucklehead like Bill Kristol or Tony Snow who don't know how, or don't care to cut off nonsense at the pass.
I hope someone uploads it, as I don't have cable.
Krugman was so rattled he actually used the non-word "ascared".
Score one for O'Reilly. Much better than his Moore interview.
But why does O'Reilly insist on saying the Iraq war was a big screw up. 1.Why can't he see that based on the information Bush had, it was the only responsible decision to make. 2. Bush has a grand vision of a democracy in the middle east. 3. This war against terrorist insurgents is absolutely vital to the success of the war on terror.
Ass and A$$hole
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