A Confession: What I Was Thinking the Morning of November 3, 2004

I would imagine a leftist might say that the people were duped by powerful monied interests. The power of the rich muddled the proper thinking of the masses.

The 2004 election really made clear to me how completely in the tank the US traditional media were — that voters were responding reasonably rationally to tremendously sophisticated misinformation.

I’ve finally figured out what creeps me out about Bryan’s book and the push that it is being given.

There is, of course, only the slightest chance that the book ever has any serious influence over future events anywhere.

But if, by cosmic coincidence, it turns out to be truly influential, is there a single person here who thinks that it will be used for anything but a justification for the seizure of power by those that Bryan would find utterly reprehensible?

I am almost certain that, should this book shape future events, it will be because it gives economic and academic approval to a single fact: “People are not fit to rule themselves”.

Of course, that’s not what the book says at all. But then the relation between “Das Kapital” and Soviet communism is pretty minimal as well. (Indeed, no doubt Bryan would be removed first – you don’t want the author around to contradict your interpretation…)

I don’t mean anything bad for the Bryan, but I have to say: I hope this book fades into obscurity. It is one of those books that I cannot see having anything but a pernicious influence (if any at all) on future events, not for what it says, but for how it would be used. Anyone who could actually put the book’s ideas to use positively would never touch consider them (tending to be members of the church of Democracy and all). For the less worthy, the one-line summary of the book is an economic and intellectual blessing for their lust for power that could only be dreamed of.

Luckily, the chance that the book has a real impact are small. But they are not zero.

People, read his book before you comment on it. It will serve you well in not looking the fool.

As for the election, I don’t think it’s good for the book. If you think about it in terms of a two horse race, then Americans chose the relatively more rational candidate (i.e. the one whose policies pander less to anti-market bias, pessimistic bias, make-work bias, and anti-foreign bias). It’s an easy case to make that W’s domestic policies “thought more like an economist” than Kerry in terms of those biases.

In an absolute sense, however, it seems that neither candidate “thought like an economist.” The book is only vindicated in the sense that the two candidates on an absolute scale pandered to the aforementioned biases. One candidate just did it to a lesser extent. Rational irrationality will help predict the candidates who are chosen in the primaries (i.e. it would predict the losses of the Ron Pauls), but not necessarily the general election.

Prof. Caplan, you should have felt that way at the time of the nominating conventions, not November 3.

I perceived George W. Bush as the lesser of evils. This is especially true regarding the defense of our nation. The Bill Clinton Democrats are long gone. Only the crazies remain. Voting for a Democratic Party candidate presidential candidate in 2008 will the same thing as voting for a socialist.

I guess 2004 did not change my view much. I am not sure how much of the problem is “irrationality” as opposed to ignorance, which are not so clearly distinguished in your book, Bryan. After all, it is rational not to be fully informed as we all know that information costs exist. The problem of how to optimize one’s own bounding of one’s own “rationality,” that is ignorance, is itself ulitmately an unresolvable problem due to infinite regress (how much time should I spend contemplating how much time I should contemplate contemplating how much time I should gather information, etc.?).

But, I was not surprised that over 60% of those voting for Bush believed that Saddam was involved in 9/11. I would say that for those who believed this, it was not at all irrational to vote for Bush. The problem was their ignorance.

Likewise, we see massive ignorance regarding such matters as the composition of the federal budget. I think this percentage has fallen recently somewhat, but a few years ago, 45% of the population thought that the largest item in the federal budget was either “welfare” (for unmarried mothers) or “foreign aid.” As those who are well informed know, both of these are essentially miniscule in the federal budget.

A real issue arises: where does all this ignorance come from? Certainly part of it comes from fears: (terrorists! unmarried black mothers! foreigners!), but certainly much of it is pushed by political interests.

So, regarding the Big Lie of the 2004 election, while the Bush administration did eventually officially admit one Friday afternoon (to be covered on about p. 23 of the next day’s WaPo and nowhere in the Wash Times) that Saddam was not involved in 9/11, at the Republican Convention, Rudy Giuliani went right from glorifying the heroics of New York fireman on 9/11 to an all out defense of the Iraq war. Nobody there caveated that particular segue. No wonder the ignorant remained ignorant. What else is new?

TGGP,

Kerry may have spent more than any previous candidate, but he did not spend more than the candidate who defeated him.

Eric,

Points well taken. Clearly the problem is more the irrational rationality, but there is no necessary reason why means coming out of rational ignorance will equal real means (I do not believe in rational expectations). I tend to agree with Mancur Olson about Wittman, just too many problems there in his “efficiency” arguments, big ones.

Sheetwise,

I produced a real stat. You come up with “tooth fairy.” Is it possible you might be a bit less childish? Or maybe you still think Saddam had something to do with 9/11…

Barkley, I guess I was wrong about Kerry outspending Bush. I thought I remembered reading that he had. I don’t think we should be concerned at all about George Soros or anybody funding any political candidate. As I noted, like Levitt I don’t think funding is that big a factor, I agree with Caplan that it is voters rather than “special interests” that are mostly responsible for the policies we have. I am also opposed to any and all campaign financing laws that try to discern whether the “wrong people” are having “improper” influence on the government.

For the record I didn’t vote for Bush or Kerry because I don’t vote, and didn’t that case didn’t particularly care who won, though I am glad that Congress and the Presidency are controlled by different parties now.

Sheetwise,

I agree that these views by Dems about Bush
9/11 are also drivel.

Regarding Salmon Pak, the final story on him
came in a long time ago. Go check it out.
The US military says it is a crock. He was
another put up job by the Chalabi-neocon crowd.

Sheetwise,

Yes, it was about two years ago that I looked
at all that Salmon Pak stuff. Forgot that it
was the location and not the officer who was
making claims about the location (forget his
name and not wasting my time to go check) who
was put forward by Chalabi with lots of bells
and whistles as part of the runup to the
invasion of Iraq.

So, for those not on top of this, the claim
by this defecting officer was that at Salmon
Pak in particular, and also a couple of other
locations, Saddam was training various terrorist
groups, some supposedly including al Qaeda
members. This claim was widely trumpeted
through various media and blogs, and periodically
gets cited by someone on a blog somewhere.
When I had this thrown at me about two years
ago by someone who was just brimming with
certainty and self-righteousness, I checked
it out.

Bottom line is that the US military checked
the whole thing out. There was training going
on at Salmon Pak, but it was by Saddam of his
own anti-terrorist squad. In case you did
not know, Sheetwise, Saddam viewed al-Zuwairi
as an enemy and had an APB out on him, contrary
to the continued mumblings issuing out of
the transexecutive-legislative office of the
Vice President. The officer making the claims
was just another part of the con job pulled
by Chalabi for the neocons.

Sheetwise,

This will be my last comment on this. If you
really believe that the Salman Pak case is not
resolved, then there are only two possible
explanations: either you have not checked the
matter out fully, or you are a hopeless case.

Look, one can argue that the case about WMD
is still not “finally resolved.” Hey, after
all, they were shipped to Syria!!! Rather
than using them against the invading force,
Saddam shipped them there so he would not be
caught with them. After all, if he had been
caught with them, he might have gotten in
serious trouble!!! As it is, well, he got
in no trouble at all, since we did not find
them on him…

The case on Salman Pak is as much of a slam
dunk as the case on WMD. The US military
really checked this out very very thoroughly,
and keep in mind there were plenty of people
in the US military who really wanted to find
that Salman Pak was what you still think it
might have been. They were very definitive
in the end, after a long and detailed study.
It was not. Case closed. More Chalabi and
Cheney and Wolfowitz lies.

If in fact you have not really checked the
reports out, do so. I have. This one is over,
and if you want to push it further after
reading the reports, sorry, you will have no
credibility.