This could launch a new cliche-analogy:
"Being [fill in blank] is like being smeared by Paul Krugman." DiLorenzo wrote a single book critical of Lincoln. He has also written How Capitalism Saved America. He is an articulate skeptic of statism in all its shirt-colors.

By contrast there is Krugman (whose Nobel, btw, came from very early work on trade, not for research on monetary or fiscal policy), whose response to a debt crisis is to demand more national spending, year after year, failing to notice the previous round's inability to generate profitable economic activity.

I was at the hearing and Seeking Alpha published an article I wrote summarizing it as well as addressing central question of "why is unemployment so high?": http://seekingalpha.com/article/252019-why-is-unemployment-too-high

The only one who came off as coherent at all was Josh Bivens of the Economic Policy Institute, although he made several errors, the greatest of which was conflating a change in the real money supply with a change in the nominal money supply. Vedder and DiLorenzo were horrible. Vedder sounded like a fire and brimstone breathing sorcerer from The Lord of the Rings. DiLorenzo bumbled through his opening statement and then proceeded to blame our current problems on "regime uncertainty" which is essentially fear of the unknown. With George Mason right across the river, and other local PhDs who advocate sound money, he had no business being in that room. All he did was disgrace the entire sound money movement and characterize it as fringe "War of Northern Aggression" talk.

Note to DiLorenzo: Don't write a book comparing Lincoln to Hitler and expect to be taken seriously by anyone.

For anyone who wants to check Krugman's drive-by, here, if Jay permits, is a link to Krugman's Times blog.

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/02/09/johnny-reb-economics/

The refence to Amity Slaes is to a CFR member, formerly of the Wall Street Journal editorial page unless my memory has failed, who has written a book critical of Roosevelt's New Deal economics.

Krugman lets it go at associations--critical of Lincoln (mostly but not solely on issues of economics and liberty) equals Johnny Reb; critical of Roosevelt equals I don't know what, something beyond the pale. Critical of the Fed--that's the point of all this. Easier to dispose of the arguments against central bank policy and mandates with a smear than to address them. Some of these arguments, reasoned and calm, by DiLorenzo and others, can be found at the Mises Institute site.

For anyone who wants to check Krugman's drive-by, here, if Jay permits, is a link to Krugman's Times blog.

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/02/09/johnny-reb-economics/

The refence to Amity Slaes is to a CFR member, formerly of the Wall Street Journal editorial page unless my memory has failed, who has written a book critical of Roosevelt's New Deal economics.

Krugman lets it go at associations--critical of Lincoln (mostly but not solely on issues of economics and liberty) equals Johnny Reb; critical of Roosevelt equals I don't know what, something beyond the pale. Critical of the Fed--that's the point of all this. Easier to dispose of the arguments against central bank policy and mandates with a smear than to address them. Some of these arguments, reasoned and calm, by DiLorenzo and others, can be found at the Mises Institute site.

Jay--You don't have to rely on Paul Krugman to tell you that DiLorenzo is a crank. All you have to do is follow the Op-Ed pages in the Baltimore Sun.

In an Op-Ed piece on August 22, 2010, DiLorenzo stated that "In order to finance a campaign, a politician must promise to steal (i.e., tax) money from those who earned it and give it to others who have no legal or moral right to it. There are (very) few exceptions, but politicians must also make promises that they know they can never keep (i.e., lie). This is why so few moral people are elected to political office. The most successful politicians are those who are the least hindered by strong moral principles. They have the least qualms about confiscating other peoples' property in order to maintain their own power, perks, and income."

The article begins here and is in three parts: http://bit.ly/hklGai The quoted portion is found on the second portion.

Stuart Levine's displeasure with Tom DiLorenzo is entertaining--the quotation he cites could have come ninety years earlier from Henry Mencken, or a bit before that from Ambrose Bierce or Mark Twain. American "cranks," one and all.

Sorry for the double post earlier.

Mencken, Bierce, and Twain were essentially satirists. DiLorenzo is serious. Hence, the appellation of "crank" applied to DiLorenzo is appropriate.

Mencken, Bierce and Twain were serious, too. As have been critics besides DiLorenzo who describe American politics as primarily the auctioning off for votes of other people's money.

The real question is why so many people think a smear--seccessionist, crank, and so on--is acceptable in response to any intellectual challenge. And the answer usually is poverty of resources.

If Jay isn't tired of this, I am, so unless someone adds "flat-earther" to the charges again DiLorenzo, I'm through.