http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2004/08/23/DDGEJ8C08L1.DTL
1000 Van Ness Avenue: "Paul Krugman's great unraveling'': It's early evening. I now finish driving at 5 p.m. I take in a movie; Tom Cruise in "Collateral." In it, the actor picks up a cab at LAX and goes on a hunting spree. He's a hit man. Cruise pays the cabdriver $600, too. This is the part that interested me. If Mr. Cruise has any unfinished business up here, I could use some fast cash.
Exiting the theater, thinking about the film, I cross the street heading south toward City Hall. At Opera Plaza, a vinyl sign reads, "Paul Krugman, Wednesday, August 11th, 7 p.m." I think, interesting, this New York columnist seems to live here. It's the 10th. I decide to listen to the dude.
On the 11th, I arrive at 6 p.m. to get a good seat. I start scanning Krugman's latest collection of columns. San Francisco is not New York City. This evening, I'm going to play the hit man. I'm going to hit P.K. with a question or two. I scan his new book, "The Great Unraveling." The subtitle is "Losing Our Way in the New Century."
I bring the ad for it, cut from the paper. In the ad, the Boston Sunday Globe calls it "a fiercely patriotic book." Then Al Franken says, "P.K. is a hero of mine." And the New York paper that he writes for claims: "Krugman's best columns showcase his fluency in economics."
Scanning the column collection, I form two questions, knowing that if I'm lucky, I will get one off. Soon all the chairs are taken, and there is standing room only. This event is free.
At 7 p.m., a man with a soft voice walks up to the podium and announces, "Let's all welcome Paul Krugman." Soon, a bearded, pudgy dude rushes out from behind a partition. This entrance is kind of like the "Tonight" show. P.K. has a laptop with him.
He starts by telling the crowd about his daily Web site fix. He monitors the www.GeorgeBush.com site. He looks for quotes. He spends a couple of minutes trying to access the site, while speaking.
In the interim, we hear little blurbs about how the Bush administration is destroying the planet. With each blurb, the audience claps and laughs. The woman sitting to my left is German. She tells me, "I was a little girl in Germany under Hitler, and you do not know what it was like."
I look at her in disbelief, then say, "Thank America you now speak English." She stares at me and says, "You must be a Republican." At this moment, the famous columnist quotes from the president. I can't remember the line, but the audience signals total agreement. P.K. closes his laptop and speaks for about 20 minutes.
He ends his talks by making a statement on the world economy.
"My buddy Robert Rubin, the ex-secretary of the Treasury, is scared. I trust him," he says.
He does not tell us about Rubin's relationship with Enron and Citibank.
Then he says, "Now I'll take your questions." He is asked about Leon Kondratieff and the economic long wave. He shows some superficial understanding of the Russian economist, then dismisses the man with a wave of his hand.
He is asked about a setback in the banking system. He tells the crowd, "I have not studied the problem yet." Responding to a question on Forex, he states, "I have studied the currency markets, and there really is no problem with the dollar versus the euro. All banks just convert when they need to."
Then I get a chance to ask this: "Based on the advertisement in the papers for your book, the paper you write for claims you have fluency in economics. What are your credentials in economics?"
At first, P.K. is a little taken aback by this question. He hesitates, then blurts, "I've written a hundred papers on the subject. I have a background and education." The audience laughs and claps hysterically. P.K. does not claim to have a degree in economics. He does not claim any formal training in the subject.
Ten minutes later, he ends the session to start book signings. I don't buy the book. He has not written 100 columns on economics, so I would like to know: Are the 100 papers available to read?
"The Great Unraveling" has a column or two about Japan. Between 1990 and today, P.K. implies, Japan's economy never collapsed. He implies that the 80 percent decline in the Nikkei, Japan's stock market average, was just normal business.
E-mail the Night Cabbie at cabbie at sfchronicle.com.