How to Sell a Mess; What "stimulus" advocates learned from the push for war with Iraq

When Washington makes a big decision—to pass the PATRIOT Act, to invade Iraq, to bail out Wall Street, to spend hundreds of billions "stimulating" the economy—the most important stage of the debate isn't the final agreement on what to do. That's just a bunch of details about portions and timing. The key stage comes in the initial rounds, when the acceptable radius of disagreement is established. Your sharpest critics are often your most radical critics, so it's important that their arguments be confined to the foreign press, the blogosphere, and other backwaters.

Once those boundaries are ratified, you must police them without pity. This is harder than it sounds. If you argue with those outsiders, you've made them a part of the debate. But you can't shut them up either. The goal then is to persuade everyone else that the dissidents simply don't deserve attention: that they're extremists, partisan flacks, or just not "serious." In 2003, "serious" people were willing to debate the evidence that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, but they considered it settled that such weapons were reason enough to invade his country. In 2009, "serious" people will debate the best ways to stimulate a slumping economy, but the arguments against a so-called stimulus itself are beyond the pale.

Not everyone will respect the borders you've established. As it became more and more obvious that the Iraq war was a bad idea, for example, critics outside the serious zone started mocking the insiders' pretentions; the term Very Serious Person became an in-joke on antiwar blogs. The left-wing pundit Matthew Yglesias was especially fond of the phrase, particularly when criticizing liberal hawks. But such mockery doesn't make the tactic any less attractive. When House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) opposed the use of stimulus money to keep state budgets in the black, it was Yglesias who declared that Boehner wasn't part of "the serious-people universe." I don't think he was being ironic.

In an even more telling moment this month, the prominent Berkeley economist Brad DeLong blogged a list of economists making, for the most part, normal free-market objections to stimulus spending: that "Congress typically spends according to its political priorities, not economic priorities," that the government "can only shift jobs from one part of the economy to the other," that "the stimulus plan will most probably turn quickly into pork spending," that Obama should "allow the marketplace to correct the errors made by the last 8 years of misguided intervention." Then DeLong informally anathematized everyone on his list, writing them off as "ethics-free Republican hacks." Setting aside questions of ethics and hackery, several of the economists he accused aren't even Republicans. But it's easier to dismiss someone when you've reduced his arguments to a matter of partisan loyalty. That's another trick you may remember from Iraq. "They're not anti-Keynesian—they're just on the other side."

On one level, the stimulus crowd hasn't been as successful as the GOP was during Bush's first term: The Democratic leadership cravenly fell in behind the PATRIOT Act and the Iraq war, but every Republican in the House voted against the Democrats' bill yesterday. On another level, the Democrats don't need to be as successful as the GOP. The bill passed the House without the Republicans' help, and it will probably pass the Senate. And in the meantime, the Dems defined the debate, excluding alternative perspectives almost as effectively as the Bushians did.

The recession is a necessary correction. It is forcing ill-conceived and poorly run companies to collapse or restructure, and it is compelling consumers to save again. Protecting those overgrown institutions and encouraging more unsustainable consumption will only delay doomsday and make it worse. It's better to endure some pain now than to endure even more pain tomorrow.

There's two things you should notice about that counternarrative. The first is that it sounds pretty radical. The second is that it isn't as radical as it sounds. It doesn't require you be a thoroughgoing libertarian opposed to all intervention in the economy. An ordinary liberal Democrat could accept it, arguing for federal efforts to ease individual pain—unemployment insurance, retraining subsidies, even direct income grants—while refusing to shore up failing institutions. You might think that would be a common position on the left: help for the dispossessed, not one dime for corporations.

But as far as Washington is concerned, it's invisible. The only Democratic legislators who broke with the bill were conservatives. Meanwhile, many Republicans have accepted the premises behind a Keynesian stimulus effort; they're just debating scale, means, and methods. Alternative ideas are out there, but Washington doesn't take them seriously.

In other words, the Dems have learned a lot from the administration they deposed. As the St. Lawrence University economist Steve Horwitz wrote this week, "Accusing your opponents of being 'ethics-free Republican hacks'...means you don't have to argue for the merits of the individual pieces, just scare the public and demonize the opposition. Of course, that's exactly what these same folks complained about after 9/11. Meet the new boss, same as the old boss indeed."

Very well thought-out piece. I’ve always suspected the decision to go into Iraq was as much to settle a family score as anything else. After 9/11, it was very easy to suppress any opposition.

This stimulus package has the same stench on it. But things are so bad that everyone save the stalwart house pubbies are willing to sign off on maybe the worst bill in US history.

Does anybody (even a Dem congresscritter) think this stimulus will stimulate anything? Has to be a vote-buying scheme. Or do they see it as way to dampen civil unrest and avoid the same fate as their counterparts in Iceland? Isn’t that basically what the New Deal was all about? Either way, it feels like something that is being rammed through quickly under less-than-honest premise.

Interesting that you see the current crisis as a referendum on Keynes/Friedman. Maybe the certain failure of this stimulus package will be so instructive that even the most obdurate spendthrift liberals will have to take notice (I can ‘hope’ for ‘change’ too). The Obamanation made some noise before the election about revisiting trade policy. Absolutely nothing now that he’s in power. Probably depending too much on China to underwrite the ‘Stimulation’.

I wouldn’t go that far. I disagree with the premise of your first two paragraphs. algore and Hillary, the French and even Saddam himself thought he had WMD’s. (opportunistic capitalists told him to give them ______ fill in the blank Iraqi dinars and they would invent a raygun to kill Americans and Jews....the joke was on Saddam).

Accusing a man of using billions of dollars of taxpayer money and American soldiers lives just to settle a Hatfield/McCoy family feud is the worst thing you could ever accuse someone of....you better have something to back it up if you are going to bring that kind of accusation.

I believe that he meant well, and time will tell whether he was right or wrong. We’ll know in 40 years. If Iraq turns into a Persian Iranian Shiite satellite state than he was a bozo. If Iraq serves as the beacon of freedom and causes authoritarian regimes and their citizens in the mideast to say “why can’t we be like them?” then it was a success.

I agree wholeheartedly with your take on the last two paragraphs.

You’re thinking of it from an informed logical intelligent perspective.

Think about it from an emotional heat of the moment perspective as an American citizen who was a victim and voter.

Re: WOT and 9/11....Bush did a great job of letting Americans move on, get on with their lives, have kids, go to graduation, bday and Christmas parties, get on with life and forget....he didn’t have that luxury. He was as evenly determined on 9/12/2001 as he was on 1/19/2009.

Most people don’t think like that. They think with their heated emotions at the time.

Think of the people who have been laid off, have no money and are wondering how they will pay the bills....they can’t think straight right now. They are in survival mode.

Libs are trying to take advantage of their emotions.

I’ve taken plenty heat for that opinion over the years. The ‘Hatfield-McCoy’ analogy is a bit simplistic.

We’ve never invaded before when other countries were busily proliferating WMD’s. Even nations with a history of hostility and/or aggression. Our gov’t didn’t do a damn thing the first time Saddam proliferated WMD’s. See also: Pakistan, North Korea, and probably soon Iran (and let’s not forget France). As long as evil dictators were content to stay within their own borders, our government was content to wag fingers. So why did we go to war this time?

There were two mitigating circumstances. The first being the Bush family History with Iraq. Hussein offered something like a $25 million bounty on GHWB back in the 90’s, and was hell-bent on thumbing his nose at W when he got in. The other being that 9/11 had just taken place.

Now personally, I think Saddam deserved a bullet in the forehead the second he took out a contract on a sitting POTUS. We should have done it (or had it done), and made no bones as to the reason it was done.

I didn’t have the sophisticated intel that was provided to W, but I never believed Saddam had WMD’s for one simple reason: money. Yes, there was some money getting in despite the embargoes, but not much in the big picture and he had a certain lifestyle to support.

But back to the original point. I don’t think that Bush would have been in any rush to start a war (WMD’s or no) if not for the undeniable family history with Hussein. Even if Saddam had WMD’s (and we had concrete proof), do you believe there is any way he could have gotten the Dems to sign off on the invasion without 9/11?

I think those who think the decision to go to Iraq was to settle a family score are a few fries short of a happy meal.

When all the intelligence agencies believed Iraq HAD WMDs, it was risky to believe that he didn’t.
When all the evidence pointed to the fact that Saddam had had WMDs, and USED WMDs, and never accounted for the WMDs that he had produced ....it would be risky to believe that suddenly, he didn’t have WMDs.

During the interviews with Saddam, before he was executed, Saddam indicated that he planned on resuming his WMD programs, it supports the fact that Saddam was a very dangerous man.

When evidence shows that Saddam had, with the complicity of a number of cheats and crooks in the UN and various countries, compromised the Oil for Food program into a Oil for Palaces and Weapons Program - it showed how dangerous Saddam would have been once the UN sanctions were dropped (which the French and Germans were pushing HARD to have happen.)

When a General who worked for Saddam indicated that Saddam had managed to move many of the WMDs that we didn’t find out of Iraq and into Syria and Lebanon (the Bakka Valley) - it becomes disingenuous to believe that “Bush Lied” rather than the fact that the evidence CONTINUES to show Saddam was a dangerous man.

And when people suggest that we should have left Saddam in place, why should we not consider those people “Monday Morning Quarterbacks” who are bigots at heart. They act as if the Iraqi people are too stupid to be given a chance at freedom, and they are only fit for being slaves of some vicious despot. Sort of like the Democrat’s mantra about the African man not being able to handle freedom, and driving this country into a Civil War in 1861. And of course, the same Democrats in the South “birthed” the terrorist wing of the Democrat party - the KKK. Their record continues - shameful and bigoted.

Why not acknowledge what everyone should realize - after Saddam invaded Kuwait, he should have been deposed, tried and convicted (and executed) ...for war crimes, for waging war on another country, for murder, for setting fire to over 600 wells when withdrawing from Kuwait, for deliberately leaking oil from wells in the Persian Gulf, etc.

But it is so much more convenient to assume the Iraq war was ONLY because Pres. Bush wanted to take out the guy who attempted to assassinate Pres. Bush (41).

Where do I even start.

I think those who think the decision to go to Iraq was to settle a family score are a few fries short of a happy meal.

And I think those who think the Bush family history played no part in the decision process are naive. Ad-hominem tit-for-tat

. When all the intelligence agencies believed Iraq HAD WMDs, it was risky to believe that he didn’t. When all the evidence pointed to the fact that Saddam had had WMDs, and USED WMDs, and never accounted for the WMDs that he had produced ....it would be risky to believe that suddenly, he didn’t have WMDs.

Other nasty regimes had nastier WMD's (and we had hard evidence). We didn't invade them. Wouldn't any thinking person ask themselves 'why Iraq'? Why then?

Bush had a legitimate score to settle with Saddam. The actual intelligence we based the invasion on could have been better scrutinized. It wasn't. I don't believe that Bush had an inclination to do so.

During the interviews with Saddam, before he was executed, Saddam indicated that he planned on resuming his WMD programs, it supports the fact that Saddam was a very dangerous man.

Yes. He would have been very dangerous if he'd had a few billion dollars to throw around. So was/is Bin Laden, among others.

When evidence shows that Saddam had, with the complicity of a number of cheats and crooks in the UN and various countries, compromised the Oil for Food program into a Oil for Palaces and Weapons Program - it showed how dangerous Saddam would have been once the UN sanctions were dropped (which the French and Germans were pushing HARD to have happen.)

If the sanctions would have been dropped, I sould have started to worry about him firing the WMD program back up. No argument there.

When a General who worked for Saddam indicated that Saddam had managed to move many of the WMDs that we didn’t find out of Iraq and into Syria and Lebanon (the Bakka Valley) - it becomes disingenuous to believe that “Bush Lied” rather than the fact that the evidence CONTINUES to show Saddam was a dangerous man.

As of 2003, he could not reach outside his borders. He knew it. He was egging Bush on for 'face' in his part of the world. He was betting the son (43) wouldn't be up to the task of finishing what his father (41) didn't follow through on. He bet wrong.

I thought it was disingenuous to try to conflate Al Qaeda and Hussein. Sunnis and Shiites mix like oil and water.

And when people suggest that we should have left Saddam in place, why should we not consider those people “Monday Morning Quarterbacks” who are bigots at heart. They act as if the Iraqi people are too stupid to be given a chance at freedom, and they are only fit for being slaves of some vicious despot. Sort of like the Democrat’s mantra about the African man not being able to handle freedom, and driving this country into a Civil War in 1861. And of course, the same Democrats in the South “birthed” the terrorist wing of the Democrat party - the KKK. Their record continues - shameful and bigoted.

Ad hominem and strawman after strawman.

Don't moralize to me. I enlisted during Desert Storm.

Funny I don't see many neocons stumping for an invasion of Sudan. Some go into apoplectic fits at the mere mention of sanctions against them. What? Religious or ethnic cleansing don't matter to us so long as we're not directly threatened? African lives aren't worth as much as Arabs or Persians? Didn't we learn anything from the Holocaust? Shameful indeed.

I wasn't for the invasion before I was against it. Other way around. I was against going in because we had bigger fish to fry in Afghanistan, and because I did not believe Saddam was a credible threat AT THAT TIME. I was against the invasion up to the point that we deployed the fleet and Bush gave Saddam an ultimatum. After that, the die was cast. I got in line and supported the troops and the mission.

Why not acknowledge what everyone should realize - after Saddam invaded Kuwait, he should have been deposed, tried and convicted (and executed) ...for war crimes, for waging war on another country, for murder, for setting fire to over 600 wells when withdrawing from Kuwait, for deliberately leaking oil from wells in the Persian Gulf, etc.

Another strawman. I thought Saddam needed to get his partly because of the reasons you mention, but mostly because of what he did to the Kurds. I volunteered to help. We were denied the opportunity to finish our job at that time.

But it is so much more convenient to assume the Iraq war was ONLY because Pres. Bush wanted to take out the guy who attempted to assassinate Pres. Bush (41).

And it's equally as convenient to write-off anyone who doesn't share your exact opinion as 'a few fries short of a happy meal', conjure up strawmen, and beat them to death.

I'm perfectly fine with the fact that Saddam ended his days swinging from a rope, and I'm sure the Iraqis are as well. I objected to the rationale that was used to sell the invasion to the country.

I believed then as now that the mission in Afghanistan was/is comprimised by our engagement in Iraq. Are we 100% positive we didn't rebuild Iraq at the cost of destabilizing Pakistan or ignoring Sudan? I guess we'll see in 10-20 years.

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