Somebody somebody:
Somebody: It's kind of sad, really. If Matt Taibbi is this economically illiterate, what hope can we have for even the most progressive segment of the American populace? You would think we were suffering under 70's style stagflation!
Notice how he frames the Fed as "anticapitalist". It's breathtaking how common this point of view is on the left - that what the U.S. exists under currently isn't really capitalism at all, but is some sort of weird crony capitalist/socialism for the rich system. If only we really had a free market! Hey, guess what guys? America is capitalist... much like the rest of the planet, except less regulated by government and less moderated by the influence of a threatening underclass.
John Gulick:
I'm not sure I'm so sanguine about the implications of the Fed letting the printing presses roll, as opposed to the US gov taxing the rich, cutting military spending, and directing mega-revenues toward a million underfunded ecological and social priorities (yeah, right) -- but otherwise you are on point. One reason there is no left in the US is there are bunch of dummies and ninnies under the spell of petty bourgeois/populist goldbug and funny money theories of a conspiratorial bent, and it's only getting worse and worse all the time. Almost everywhere is shit but the US is even shittier. I would appeal to God but there is no God so far as I can tell...
And although I haven't read it, I thought Taibbi just published an across-the-board excoriation of the TP'ers. So why is he recapitulating their asinine funny money theory? What a doofus...