# An Open Letter to Paul Krugman **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [September 12, 2011, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105 "2011-09-12T22:52:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 4:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105/61 "2011-09-13T04:15:37Z")
> [@keeganst94](#): > > Bush is not my chimpanzee, but this is a bit fucking ridiculous. Did Bush exploit 9/11? Yes. Did he do it to invade Iraq? Yes. Did he do it to kill innocent people? No. No, he just didn’t care about them if they got in his way. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105/62 "2011-09-13T04:17:18Z")
> [@keeganst94](#): > > I’m sure it doesn’t. But it should have distinction to us, the distinction between an incompetent killing somebody through negligence, and somebody, with malice and forethought, killing somebody. The Iraqis we killed were killed with great competence and forethought. They weren’t killed by accident, they were killed cynically. ---
**Author:** ![keeganst94](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/a6a055/32.png) [@keeganst94](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/keeganst94)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 4:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105/63 "2011-09-13T04:22:48Z")
> [@](#): > > No, he just didn’t care about them if they got in his way. Then stop implying that he deliberately murdered people. I agree, he really didn’t care, or at least vastly underestimated the damage he would cause. He was an idiot. He was an asshole. He did not try to kill people. Otherwise, I completely agree with you. > [@](#): > > The Iraqis we killed were killed with great competence and forethought. Some were, I’m sure, and some weren’t. The civilian casualties were not killed with forethought. > [@](#): > > They weren’t killed by accident, they were killed cynically. I agree. ---
**Author:** ![keeganst94](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/a6a055/32.png) [@keeganst94](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/keeganst94)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 4:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105/64 "2011-09-13T04:29:11Z")
Fuck, I missed the edit window. Please let I agree, after the last quote, read as follows: I think they were killed by accident, but still cynically, because Bush and others knew that some would be killed, and decided to continue anyway. They were not planned executions, though. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 4:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105/65 "2011-09-13T04:59:35Z")
I didn’t mean to imply that they were, or that they were the reason for the the invasion. Obviously, Bush didn’t invade Iraq _in order_ to kill civilians. Actually, I’ve softened in my view of Bush enough to think that he probably wasn’t malicious or heartless, but just got bullshitted by Cheney and others into believing that the invasion would be quick and painless. ---
**Author:** ![keeganst94](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/a6a055/32.png) [@keeganst94](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/keeganst94)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 5:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105/66 "2011-09-13T05:02:59Z")
That’s pretty much what I think. Just the way you phrased seemed to imply to me that you believed that he was _trying_ to kill civilians. ---
**Author:** ![YogSothoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/8edcca/32.png) [@YogSothoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YogSothoth)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 5:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105/67 "2011-09-13T05:07:52Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > Yes. Iraq was a kindly and innocent place during the halcyon days of gassing Kurds and burning oilfields. Saddam Hussein really just wanted to be loved for who he was. > They were completely innocent before the great Satan, Bush, attacked. Dude, totally besides the point. Saddam was in no way a part of 9/11. What Bush did was get rid of a bad guy, but there are plenty of bad guys around, many arguably worse. The crime was the deception of using 9/11 and abusing the nation’s good will to settle a personal vendetta. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 5:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105/68 "2011-09-13T05:23:49Z")
> [@keeganst94](#): > > > [@](#): > > > > No, he just didn’t care about them if they got in his way. > > Then stop implying that he deliberately murdered people. I agree, he really didn’t care, or at least vastly underestimated the damage he would cause. He was an idiot. He was an asshole. He did not try to kill people. :rolleyes: By that logic if someone shoots you and your entire family so they can rob your house without interference, that isn’t murder. > [@YogSosoth](#): > > Dude, totally besides the point. Saddam was in no way a part of 9/11. What Bush did was get rid of a bad guy, but there are plenty of bad guys around, many arguably worse. Including Bush himself. ---
**Author:** ![Harborwolf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c89c15/32.png) [@Harborwolf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harborwolf)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 9:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105/69 "2011-09-13T09:30:46Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > This is ridiculous. Telling others to show some decorum is not, in itself, indecorous. And if that were all he was doing, I’d be fine with it. He’s not. He’s saying that the mood of the country is more sedate because the country agrees with him (Paul Krugman) and is ashamed of these politicians. How is that any different from what Giuliani has done? It’s a simple question. ---
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 10:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105/70 "2011-09-13T10:07:43Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > You are making the same argument that a Westboro Baptist would no doubt make to defend his actions. That is, they would likely say that “God does hate fags, and God is punishing America for being permissive to homosexuality, and therefore what we are doing is justified, even necessary.” > > … > > If you don’t get that than I think you belong right there, next to Fred Phelps, holding up hate signs at funerals. You know what? You’re a mouth-breathing idiot. Krugman isn’t celebrating or gloating over the deaths of people who died on 9/11. He’s not saying it was good or necessary or that it benefits us by showing the error of our ways. He’s criticising two things… first, politicians exploiting it for their own image, and second, hiding behind it to deflect criticism of their actions. You are exemplary of the second cowardly, ignorant ploy in action, so busy rolling around in ashes and wailing ‘woe is us’ that you abdicate the citizen’s first responsibility to look at their government with a critical eye. More shameful than that, you dissuade others from doing the same. Probably the most monumentally stupid and shameful thing, which I have no doubt you’re guilty of, is turning a blind eye toward the monumentally wasteful and stupid Iraq war which was pitched on false evidence in the name of 9/11 while simultaneously screeching about “Obama’s deficit”. I have had it up to here with you lying, dishonest assholes. So go eat a bucket of dicks, you goddamned stupid coward. And now, like the rest of your ilk, go curl up in a corner and cry fake tears like a little girl at the incivility of me responding to your bullshit with the strong language it deserves. ---
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 10:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105/71 "2011-09-13T10:13:32Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > He turned off coments for his article. Oh come on, you whining little fool, you know that the freedom of the press doesn’t mean you get to use someone else’s press for free. God, what children you people are, you’re worse than the strawman liberals that your type likes to wail about. “WAAH WAAH! I didn’t get to post whatever I want wherever I want when I want. I’m too stupid start my own blog on one of the thousands of free blog services out there. OPPRESSION!” Moron. Krugman was entitled to turn off comments on his own article, and he was right to do so. It would have been nothing but fake outrage from dumb-bots like yourself. ---
**Author:** ![Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/8edcca/32.png) [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hentor_the_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 12:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105/72 "2011-09-13T12:01:30Z")
I’m not at all surprised that **Scylla** has re-vomited some conservative faux outraged here for us. After all, he is himself too stupid to think through the issues very well, and is on top of that a douchebag. In short, douchebag’s gotta douche. I am surprised at **Harborwolf** trying his hand at the old (or is it really a recent invention?) conservative “tolerance of intolerance” logical construction. If I happen to say anything about the way that 9/11 was crassly co-opted for use in political ads, somehow I’m also crassly co-opting 9/11? The Onion’s piece about Giulliani running for President of 9/11 was itself stained by its cynical disregard for 9/11? I simply am at a loss as to how one could legitimately express concerns for the appropriation by others of 9/11, or indeed any similar issue or circumstance, under **Harborwolf’s** line of reasoning. ---
**Author:** ![Scylla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@Scylla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scylla)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 12:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105/73 "2011-09-13T12:38:57Z")
> [@Raygun99](#): > > That wasn’t the definition of “innocent” being used and you know it. Why do I know you know it? Because there’s not a single country in the world that’s innocent of any wrong doing under those standards (some are of course less odious than others). Iraq was innocent of any connection to the 9/11 attacks, which is the standard being used, and you’re just attempting a very transparent dodge to draw attention away from the fact that you know your argument is weak. So, you think we invaded Iraq because we thought they were involved in 9/11, and this place has gone so far to the dogs that nobody here has bothered to correct you? What’s the point? This place is like the end of Invasion of the body Snatchers where the hero (me) realizes that he’s the last one left. Everybody else has been taken over by pod plants. Anybody else out there stl awake? ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 12:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105/74 "2011-09-13T12:47:47Z")
Given Krugman’s frequent descents into rabid partisanship, his 9/11 column is relatively subdued. I can’t work up much outrage over it. Locking comments was cowardly, though. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 12:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105/75 "2011-09-13T12:50:59Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > Actually, I’ve softened in my view of Bush enough to think that he probably wasn’t malicious or heartless, but just got bullshitted by Cheney and others into believing that the invasion would be quick and painless. Damn, it’s weird to be more of a hardass than you about something like this. But the _invasion_ was quick and painless; the question was always, what next? It was in the newspapers, even, that the Administration had no plan for this - this came out at Congressional hearings, it made the news for a day back in February 2003, then everybody moved on, and nobody who had been cheerleading for the war stopped doing so as a result of this knowledge. And pretty much anyone paying modest attention to Iraq knew about the divisions between Sunni and Shi’ite Arabs, and between Arabs and Kurds, and should have at least had a vague awareness that there were manifold divisions within these larger groupings. Removing Saddam was a clear opening for a descent into a Hobbesian war of all against all; the question was never how do we avoid killing lots of Iraqis, it was how do we keep them from killing _each other_ in large numbers. I don’t know how Cheney could have bullshitted him into believing we had a plan for the aftermath of the invasion, because there never was a plan, and that was public knowledge. If Bush let himself be conned on this score, he did that to himself. ---
**Author:** ![Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/8edcca/32.png) [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hentor_the_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 1:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105/76 "2011-09-13T13:02:07Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > So, you think we invaded Iraq because we thought they were involved in 9/11, and this place has gone so far to the dogs that nobody here has bothered to correct you? > > What’s the point? > > This place is like the end of Invasion of the body Snatchers where the hero (me) realizes that he’s the last one left. Everybody else has been taken over by pod plants. > > Anybody else out there stl awake? Yeah, anyone else think **Scylla** is a hero? ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105/77 "2011-09-13T13:14:11Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > Locking comments was cowardly, though. The deal here is that, for reasons I don’t really understand, Krugman actually has to spend a nontrivial amount of his own time moderating his comments if he wants them moderated at all. (I would think most of this could be palmed off on the news biz equivalent of a grad student, but apparently I would be wrong.) This is hardly the first time he’s turned off comments simply because dealing with them would just take too much time out of his life. At any rate, his turning off comments for that post was completely consistent with his past practice; this wasn’t just some one-off. You could criticize his overall policy re turning comments off, but one would have to be familiar with it to do so. ---
**Author:** ![Merijeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f05b48/32.png) [@Merijeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merijeek)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 1:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105/78 "2011-09-13T13:20:38Z")
> [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](#): > > I simply am at a loss as to how one could legitimately express concerns for the appropriation by others of 9/11, or indeed any similar issue or circumstance, under **Harborwolf’s** line of reasoning. Pretty sure to do so you need to have a (R) after your name. -Joe ---
**Author:** ![Baal\_Houtham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baal_houtham/32/13604_2.png) [@Baal\_Houtham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baal_Houtham)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 1:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105/79 "2011-09-13T13:21:11Z")
> [@Hentor\_the\_Barbarian](#): > > Yeah, anyone else think **Scylla** is a hero? I’m going with Posting While Drunk. Erm, make that “while drinking” because he’s getting less lucid as the thread progresses. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2011, 1:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105/80 "2011-09-13T13:23:05Z")
> [@Scylla](#): > > So, you think we invaded Iraq because we thought they were involved in 9/11 Even at this late date, AFAICT we don’t know why we invaded Iraq. As one of Rummy’s deputies famously said, the WMD BS was just the story they agreed on. We invaded Iraq because Bush and Cheney wanted to, and did a good job of buffaloing Congress into giving them the power to do so. Why they wanted to…well, who knows besides them, really? > [@](#): > > This place is like the end of Invasion of the body Snatchers where the hero (me) realizes that he’s the last one left. Everybody else has been taken over by pod plants. > > Anybody else out there stl awake? Yeah, you’re sane, it’s _everyone else_ who’s crazy. In the movies, sometimes the guy spouting that line really is sane. Never true IRL though. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/an-open-letter-to-paul-krugman/596105.md?page=5)