As I’ve often written, we’re in a strange state now where people who actually take textbook economics and simple arithmetic seriously are seen as dangerously radical and irresponsible, while people who believe in invisible bond vigilantes and confidence fairies, who claim to know what the market will want even though there’s no sign of that desire in current asset prices, are viewed as Very Serious.
Anyway, the arithmetic of debt is much less scary than you might think.
Well, there are the facts. And then there's a huge population in America that's driven by anti-fact delirium We've seen it across the political scene where destructive fantasies replace simple truths.
Hell, we've seen it in rapture predictions and we encounter it daily in reports of America's demise by debt.
That's a choice on the part of the right to deny the truth any right of expression in their politics. The rest of us don't have to panic along with them. In fact, we don't have to panic at all. Paul Krugman -- once again! -- adds it up. Investors sometimes panic, even when things are going very well. If you're what we might call a fact-based investor rather than an emotional investor, the numbers are here.
