Sparked by a recent Krugman article comparing Europe and America to the latter's detriment a lot of counter arguments have sprung up mainly focused on how Krugman cherry picked economic data to make his point - hardly a surprise an uber liberal like himself is more interested in polemics than objective analysis - but I'm thinking it's simpler than that, because what he's really suggesting, the two obvious conclusions to draw from his argument are that American culture must be radically changed, since the European economy is the direct consequence of its culture and a specific mindset and so if you want America to mimic Europe your gonna have to send out the liberal thought police to enforce the necessary standards - but also, and unbelievably more shocking I think, is that what he's suggesting, or the unavoidable consequence to what he's suggesting is that the West should unilaterally divest itself of military power since America is that power and if you're gonna change it into Europe the Younger you can say goodbye to that power. No doubt he harbours some fantasy that Europe's de facto pacifism is solely the result of its bloody history and not a symptom of the need to indulge its citizens with 35 hour work weeks and generous pension payouts and ostensibly free health care etc etc and hence there's no reason to fret that American military power would be neutered if it went down the same socially enlightened rabbit hole - but, like I said, that's a convenient fantasy.
Sorry, it's insane, delusional thinking - at least to someone who's not a new age socialist like Krugman. You wanna play a 'what if' game and fool around with various scenarios and speculations for the purposes of looking at things in a different and possibly revealing way, sure, go ahead, have your fun - but Krugman's actually suggesting this as something that should happen, which means he's basically saying that if the opportunity should present itself he'd be okay with a revolution led by a liberal elite to remake America into a polity they deem acceptable. After all, imagine how lauded a man such as himself would be in this utopia. It's utterly astounding. I don't think conservative voices rising up to ridicule the article are quite catching just how preposterous, if pursued to its logical conclusions, the idea is.
