DeLong recently asked on his blog why his traffic spiked on Jan. 10. He said he couldn't fugure it out. That was, of course, the day he attacked numerous economists who oppose the Democrats' stimulus bill as Republican shills.
It kicked off a round of discussions on other econ blogs. Many of those economists are not Republican and pointed that out. Others, who were not even involved in the inital debate objected to DeLong's ad hominen attacks.
People have politely tried to point this out on DeLong's blog, only to have their comments quickly removed, as is his custom when dealing with critics. It's been pretty funny to watch.
What hasn't been funny is to see libertarians sit on panel discussions with him or to see him invited to the Cato Institute to speak. I'm all for discussion, debate and interaction with serious scholars of all persuasions. But I don't see why you would reward someone with a history of rudeness, ad hominem attacks, deliberate distortions of others viewpoints and general unscholarly behavior. What is to be gained from talking to someone like that. Then again, Cato is the organization whose vice president for research gave his impimatur to the Iraq War.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment