Charlie Rose

Beej  03/22/2013 11:45 AM Report

Many comments have already pointed out the strangeness of this program. Mr. Rose lost control at times, and Mr. Scarborough bullied Mr. Krugman needlessly and pointlessly. Mr. Scarborough came to this session with only one piece of preparation (probably not even dug up by him) - a totally irrelevant quote, out of context, from something written by Mr. Krugman 15 years ago, when we had a totally different fiscal outlook.

Mr. Krugman effectively stated his thinking about what we need to do today. But when Mr. Rose asked Mr. Scarborough, simply and directly, what he thought we should be doing today, his response was that the President needs to meet with Congressional leaders to discuss options. In other words, Mr. Scarborough knows how to attack, but does not have a single thought about policies in spite of the endless conversations he has had on his own show about the actions Washington should take. His response only confirmed what we probably knew. He mouths "conservative" principals like a true politician on the attack (totally out of place in this venue), without any discernible understanding of complex economic issues.

Mr. Krugman has been a strong advocate of well-documented and supported economic policies. Mr. Scarborough likes to hear himself talk, but presents no more than sheepish grins when asked to state his own considered opinions. At this point of the program I did something I rarely do. I turned off the Charlie Rose Show.

gwoodruf  03/13/2013 02:07 AM Report

"Joe Scarborough was given free rein, while Paul Krugman was repeatedly stopped (often in a rude way) by Charlie from completing a thought."

Joe really never said anything worth interrupting of following up on.

It's as if Joe Scarborough had never seen the Charlie Rose show and didn't understand the normal quality of the show and the viewership. It's hard for me to believe that Joe could come to a debate like that thinking all he had to do was rely on this strange "This is what you said in 2006" followed by Paul Krugman explaining the difference and Joe staring blankly.

michael54  03/12/2013 06:46 AM Report

My thanks to Charlie Rose for arranging and hosting this debate between two prominent people on this issue. It was a notable chance to see the contrast between them.

Joe: "I'm looking at your words and want to know what changed."

Krugman had already explained multiple times what had changed.

Krugman is an analytical researcher. Joe seems to be a slippery agent for the banksters.

I would have liked to hear some discussion of the gargantuan, multi-faceted rip-off of the American economy by the banking-military sector during the Bush-Cheney administration. Let's put the perpetrators in jail and put legal blocks in place to prevent such future plundering. THEN look at the country's economic situation.

gjamesmoore  03/12/2013 05:54 AM Report

I don't understand the hostility between Krugman and Scarborough. They agree: We have a short term jobs/GDP problem and a long term debt problem due to entitlements. Scarborough is emphasizing the long term and Krugman is emphasizing the short term. Seems to me that's a perfect recipe for a big deal. Gittir done, Washington...you big drama queen.

Max83  03/12/2013 04:11 AM Report

For a National Investment Bank

Robert Skidelsky and Felix Martin

New York Review of Books | Wednesday, March 30, 2011

Link: http://www.skidelskyr.com/site/article/for-a-national-investment-bank/

President Obama is in a bind. He knows that the economic recovery is fragile and dependent on continued fiscal stimulus—hence the bipartisan deal on further tax breaks he brokered in December. But he also knows that the tolerance in Washington for deficits of close to 10 percent of Gross Domestic Product is running out. In the short term, the politics of the new Congress will not allow them; and in the long term, the President’s own National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform has warned against them.

The President’s dilemma was on open display in his State of the Union address in January. It is, he said, deficit spending by government that has “broken the back of this recession”; and government-supported investment in innovation, education, and infrastructure that is needed to “win the future.” But while sending to Congress a budget that he promised will produce “countless new jobs,” the President at the same time proposed to cut the deficit by more than $400 billion over the next decade.

Overall investment and spending must be maintained by the government in order to support the economy at a time when unemployment remains at unprecedented postwar levels and a quarter of home owners owe more on their mortgages than the value of their property. The Federal Reserve has tried to stimulate the economy through a loose monetary policy, keeping interest rates very low and purchasing $600 billion in Treasury notes from big banks in an effort to make more money available to the banking system—a measure called quantitative easing. But the deficit must also be cut in order to preserve the nation’s creditworthiness.

This is the urgent challenge the President knows America is facing. Is there a way to square the circle? Part of the solution, we believe, lies in the creation of a National Investment Bank that will produce more jobs while not seriously increasing the deficit. Behind this lies solid economic theory.

The theory is Keynesian. John Maynard Keynes did not deny that market economies recovered “naturally” from slumps. He argued that their natural recovery mechanisms were too weak to bring them back to “full employment” within a “reasonable time” (say, three or four years). When private business confidence has been crushed and private investors’ appetite for risk has been curtailed by the painful experience of a recession, private spending will remain in the doldrums for a prolonged period even though output is well below capacity, resources lie idle, and people are unemployed. This is what occurred during the Great Depression, when the American economy took eight years after 1929 to regain its pre-crash peak output, and unemployment remained over 10 percent for more than a decade.

In these circumstances, Keynes argued that the government should run an increased budget deficit to support recovery, because the government is the sole agency able to prevent total spending in the economy from falling below a reasonable level of activity and employment. If private spending is depressed the government can restore “aggregate demand”—the total spending and investment in the economy—to a higher level by adding to its own spending or reducing taxes. By contrast, any attempt to reduce the fiscal deficit while large spare capacity exists will only make matters worse. If the economy is severely “underemployed,” government spending that produces a deficit will not “crowd out” private spending. It will replace private spending that is not taking place.

Few dispute that the US is not enjoying a normal recovery by recent standards. Economists talk about the persistence of the “output gap”—a theoretical concept that captures the difference between what the economy could produce if all available resources were employed and what it actually does. The Congressional Budget Office, for example, estimates in its latest assessment that the economy is still running at nearly 6 percent below potential.1

The man or woman in the street has a more direct measure of the problem: an unemployment rate close to 9 percent three years after the recession began. In the recessions of the early 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s, by this point in the recovery the total number of Americans employed was at, or above, the total number employed before the recession began. At the end of 2010, there were still more than seven million fewer Americans with jobs, full-time and part-time, than in March 2008. In this dismal situation, it is not surprising that Keynes’s diagnosis and his policy prescriptions have had a major revival, and fiscal policy throughout the OECD nations reflected this in the initial period of the global financial crisis. Fiscal stimulus in order to stabilize aggregate demand became the order of the day.

As the crisis itself recedes into the distance, however, old dogmas have reemerged. The Keynesian case for deficit spending is challenged by the theory of “expansionary fiscal contraction,” which alleges that deficit spending will, on the one hand, “crowd out” private spending by depressing consumption. This will happen as households save more to pay anticipated higher taxes that will have been increased in order to pay for deficit spending. The public deficit will also constrain investment, since interest rates will have to rise as the government borrows money to cover the deficit. On the other hand, the theory proposes that “fiscal consolidation,” or reduction of the deficit, will increase household consumption, since households no longer anticipate increased taxes, and also investment, by making credit cheaper.

The conditions needed to validate this theory are highly unreal, and there is negligible empirical evidence to support it.2 But the vague air of moral rectitude that surrounds policies of austerity has reexerted a powerful influence over financial markets, and in its name, most OECD countries have now agreed on four- or five-year plans to liquidate deficits. “Fiscal consolidation” has become the new orthodoxy.

The US is no exception. The Simpson-Bowles commission on the deficit has confirmed that the US faces larger long-term fiscal challenges than most other countries, and that major reform is needed. The Republican majority in the House of Representatives has placed cutting government expenditure at the heart of the political agenda for both parties. For the time being at least, the ideological winds have changed, and the President knows that it would be unrealistic to expect any further help from direct fiscal stimulus, despite the lethargic pace of the recovery.

So the situation the President faces can be summarized as follows. Aggregate demand is not recovering sufficiently, and continues to need stimulus in order to restore employment to a reasonable level within an acceptable span of time. But it has become politically impossible to increase the government deficit; and even the extraordinarily loose monetary policy we have mentioned is not proving sufficiently effective to produce a full recovery. The tall order facing President Obama, then, is to find policies that can maintain demand without expanding the deficit. The creation of a National Investment Bank should be at the top of his list. A National Investment Bank could achieve two goals simultaneously: it could improve the long-term prospects of the US economy for growth by improving its facilities for energy, transportation, water supply, and much else, while offsetting the contractionary effects of orthodox fiscal policy.

The first goal is likely to be the least controversial. After all, it was on these grounds that a National Infrastructure Reinvestment Bank was proposed in Congress in 2007 and 2009. On March 15 of this year a bipartisan group of senators headed by John Kerry proposed an infrastructure bank on exactly these grounds. The traditional case for public development banks is that they can incorporate national policy objectives into their lending strategies—and by doing so, avoid short-term “market failures” in private capital markets—failures that result in the lack of funding for projects of long-term value to the national economy. Unlike a commercial bank, a National Investment Bank would appraise such projects for financing not only on the basis of their profitability—though this would still be a necessary condition for approval—but also on the basis of their contribution to national policy objectives—such as the promotion of exports, the repair and development of infrastructure, and the efficient reduction of carbon emissions. Such an appraisal would thus take into account the benefits that such projects would bring to the broader economy.

This traditional rationale for such a National Investment Bank is a powerful one in the contemporary United States economy. The administration has acknowledged that the financial crisis and its aftermath have exposed the needs for fundamental restructuring of the economy. As the President put it in his State of the Union address, “to win the future, we’ll need to take on challenges that have been decades in the making.”

Rebalancing the economy toward exports is one example of what is needed. The twenty-five-year credit boom that began in the mid-1980s generated an unbalanced economy, in which domestic sectors such as construction and real estate grew at an excessive rate, while exporting industries such as manufacturing lagged behind. America’s foreign trade was roughly in balance in the 1970s; in the two years leading up to the recession, the current account deficit in foreign trade averaged 6.5 percent of GDP. To reverse the trade imbalance, the administration has stated its ambition to double exports by 2015. A National Investment Bank could support the President’s National Export Initiative by giving priority to new export industries because of the real economic benefits they would bring in reducing America’s dependence on borrowing from abroad to pay for foreign products.

Another example of the structural economic challenges that a National Investment Bank could help meet is the deterioration of American infrastructure. Investment in America’s transport, energy, and water systems has been allowed to fall to critically low levels over the past four decades. In 2009, the American Society of Civil Engineers estimated investment needs over the next five years alone of $2.2 trillion. Its “Report Card” gave a D or D–rating to the country’s current facilities for aviation, energy, hazardous waste, roads, levees, schools, and transit, among others.

But infrastructure is a prime example of a sector in which the benefits of a project to the broader economy are larger than the private financial return to the owner, with the result that private capital markets, left to their own devices, tend to fund less infrastructure investment than is optimal for the economy as a whole. What is more, the current system of allocating public money to such investment is hopelessly politicized, subject to the pressures of state and local governments and the individual demands of congressmen and senators. As Felix Rohatyn and Everett Erlich proposed in these pages before the crisis struck, a National Investment Bank is the ideal vehicle for solving both these problems.3

The traditional arguments for a public development bank strongly apply in the fields of energy and the environment. The development of new technologies in renewable energy production to help meet America’s energy security and environmental challenges is a national priority. Because such energy resources require long lead times, critical levels of volume, and an effective regulatory policy, private capital markets will tend to fall short of America’s needs. A National Investment Bank could take the lead in financing green technologies such as wind and geothermal power by evaluating and incorporating into its appraisals the value of their benefits to the broader economy.

But could a National Investment Bank also help with the urgent problem of the weak recovery and the exhaustion of the current policy options? We believe that it could.

Keynes was skeptical that economies can stage spontaneous recoveries from major slumps because he recognized the central importance of confidence in a market system. The destruction of confidence caused by a severe recession leads to a collapse in investment, which leads to further deterioration in confidence, and hence to further reduction in investment. In a slump, there is no shortage of savings and liquidity in the economy (and this is why further increasing liquidity, for example by quantitative easing, does little good). The problem is that private businesses do not want to borrow and invest—regardless of how low interest rates on borrowing are—because the future is particularly uncertain and they see no clear prospects for future demand.

The current situation in the US conforms closely to Keynes’s analysis. There is no shortage of savings—the proportion of disposable income that American households save has jumped from below 2 percent immediately before the crisis to over 5 percent today, and US banks are sitting on record levels of cash. But there is a chronic shortage of confidence in future demand—so these savings are sitting in the most riskless of places—in short-term Treasury bills, and in banks’ accounts at the Federal Reserve.

Keynes’s summary of the situation in 1932 still makes sense today, though in less extreme degree:

It may still be the case that the lender, with his confidence shattered by his experience, will continue to ask for new enterprise rates of interest which the borrower cannot expect to earn…. If this proves to be so, there will be no means of escape from prolonged and perhaps interminable depression except by state intervention to promote and subsidise new investment.

The central challenge is to restore confidence on the one hand and on the other to find a way of deploying idle cash to finance the resulting investments. Keynes argued for the direct solution: let the government do both. By increasing fiscal expenditure, it will support demand now and bolster confidence for the future; and by issuing bonds to finance the resulting deficit, it will put the savings currently hiding in cash and Treasury bills to work. In effect, expenditures sponsored by government would substitute for the lost confidence of the private sector until business regains the confidence needed for future investment.

For the time being such a policy is politically impossible, as President Obama has made clear. But the creation of a National Investment Bank provides an alternative solution—and one that has the cardinal virtue, in the current political situation, of not requiring the government to increase its borrowing significantly. As in the classical Keynesian solution, the federal government can revive confidence by making clear its support for large-scale, long-term investment programs—programs that will involve tens of billions of dollars of investment and generate hundreds of thousands of jobs. But unlike in the classical solution, the investments will be made by the private sector or by local governments, and the idle cash to fund these investments will be borrowed and deployed not by the federal government but by the National Investment Bank.

Of course, the creation of a National Investment Bank cannot be a fiscal free lunch. Congress would need to appropriate sufficient funds to inject the initial capital of the bank. But the essence of banking is the ability to make loans up to a multiple of several times initial capital. For every dollar of initial capital from Congress, the National Investment Bank would be able to finance investment up to a sizable multiple of this initial capital by borrowing the extra dollars now languishing in the private capital markets. It would operate in two main ways. In some cases, the bank would offer a partial or full guarantee of repayment on bonds issued directly by investment projects themselves, thereby assuming some or all of the risk of the projects, and so reducing their cost of funding. But for the most part, the bank itself would lend to finance investment projects, and raise funds for lending from the capital markets by issuing long-term bonds carrying a modest premium over the interest rate on government securities. Such National Investment Bank bonds would likely be attractive assets for pension funds and other long-term investors.

Such are the principles of our proposal, but what about the practicalities? Could a National Investment Bank operate on a scale that would make a material difference to aggregate demand and employment? And how would the bank operate in practice?

A useful example of the scale of what our proposal could achieve is provided by the European Investment Bank (EIB). The European Union has an economy of a similar size and level of development to the US—in 2010 the GDP of the EU was around $16 trillion, and of the US around $15 trillion—and the EIB is its public development bank. The EU governments that own the EIB have contributed approximately $50 billion of capital to it; and the bank currently borrows a further $420 billion from the private capital markets to finance a total lending portfolio of some $470 billion. In other words, for a fiscal outlay of $50 billion, the EU governments are able to finance investments worth more than $470 billion. The EIB has funded major infrastructure projects throughout Europe, from the port of Barcelona to the Warsaw beltway, and from France’s famous TGV network to Britain’s new, world-leading offshore wind industry. In doing so, it has consistently turned a profit and maintained negligible delinquencies over five decades.

If a US National Investment Bank were established on a similar scale, the investment spending it could therefore finance over ten years at a direct cost of around $50 billion could more than offset the $400 billion of expenditure cuts promised by President Obama in his State of the Union Address and proposed in his recent budget over the same period. The bank would achieve a more than $400 billion increase in aggregate demand in return for a $50 billion increase in the federal government’s debt. But the real return would be much greater. By making clear a national commitment to a coherent and rigorously appraised program of economic restructuring and the investment necessary to support it, the bank would also revive confidence in demand and so provide the basis for a self-sustaining private sector recovery.

As for the details of the bank’s operations and governance, there is a wealth of successful precedents, from the German Kreditanstalt fur Wiederafbau (KfW) in Europe, to the Korea Development Bank (KDB) and the Development Bank of Japan (DBJ) in Asia. The common features are government ownership, a conservative ratio of lending to capital, and a clear mandate to support long-term national economic priorities. It is important that the bank should function as a professional organization with political independence in its daily operations, in order to ensure that the projects would be rigorously appraised according to the needs for infrastructure they would fulfill and for their future profitability.

The Federal Reserve provides an existing and well-accepted model for how political accountability can be combined with operational independence. The National Investment Bank could follow the same model for the appointment of its chief executive and supervisory board. As with the Fed, the chief executive and Board of Governors could be appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate. It would be audited by an inspector-general and the Government Accountability Office.

In fact, the US government is no stranger to running development banks as a result of its existing involvement in the World Bank and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, in both of which it is a major shareholder, and in which US citizens hold many senior executive positions. (It is worth remembering that a number of distinguished bankers and businessmen have been willing to preside over the World Bank, from Eugene Meyer and John McCloy in its early years to James Wolfensohn in the last decade.) There is now an opportunity for America to put to work the expertise it has accumulated in these institutions in meeting its own economic challenges.

The creation of a National Investment Bank would also have a final benefit that would be peripheral to its main purpose but might in the long run be its most important. The financial crisis has left the impression that the main purpose of the banking sector is to enrich a tiny elite at the expense of taxpayers. Adair Turner, the chairman of the UK Financial Services Authority, expressed a widespread sentiment when he said in a review of the past decade of financial innovation that much of it was “socially useless..”4 In fact, the public understands that a well-functioning financial system is essential to the US economy; and in the light of recent experience, many also understand that extensive changes in behavior are required to bring such a system into being. Apart from the Dodd-Frank bill passed in July 2010, further regulatory reform for existing banks is clearly necessary, as the recent findings of the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, under Phil Angelides, have made clear. But such comprehensive efforts will be complex, and new regulatory regimes in particular take time to become established.

A National Investment Bank, by contrast, would be able to adopt stricter rules from its inception, and thus demonstrate the social value of the financial sector to a quite justifiably disenchanted public. It could restore confidence, not only in future demand, but in banks and in banking itself.

1. The CBO estimated the output gap at 5.7 percent of potential GDP in its Budget and Economic Outlook: Fiscal Years 2011 to 2021 of January 2011.

2. For the theory of expansionary fiscal contraction, and evidence, see Rosaria Rita Canale, Pasquale Foresti, Ugo Marani, and Oreste Napolitano, "On Keynesian Effects of (Apparent) Non-Keynesian Fiscal Policies," Discussion Paper No. 8, 2007, Department of Economic Studies, University of Naples ‘Parthenope.' The authors conclude that fiscal contraction may be consistent with expansion of aggregate demand if monetary policy leads to a devaluation at the same time. But it is the monetary loosening, not the fiscal contraction, that has this effect. These findings are corroborated in the IMF's latest study of the issue in Chapter 3 of its October 2010 World Economic Outlook .

3. The theory of expansionary fiscal contraction confuses a correlation with a cause. See Felix Rohatyn and Everett Erlich, "A New Bank to Save Our Infrastructure," The New York Review , October 9, 2008.

4. "How to Tame Global Finance," Prospect , August 2009.

Ricardo_Amaral  03/11/2013 12:30 PM Report

@SharkswithfrikingLazers - I just finished reading the special report Time magazine published dated March 4, 2013 "Bitter Pill" Why Medical bills are killing us - By: Steven Brill.

Steven Brill gave us on that report an outstanding analysis of the current healthcare system in the US.

After reading his article the public would have a better understanding why the healthcare area is completely out of control regarding the cost of healthcare in the United States.

I wanted to get an extra copy of this magazine to pass it around among my family and friends, but this issue of Time magazine has been sold out in our area.

It looks like some people did read the article and mentioned to their friends and relatives and this issue of Time was sold out almost overnight.

.

SharkswithfrikingLazers  03/11/2013 04:07 AM Report

CNN had a great special on Sunday night:

http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/health/escape-fire-documentary/index.html

Paul tells us Medicare math and Medicaid math do not add up but this is not going to hit right away. Healthcare needs to be much cheaper. Pilot projects. Research into what actually works. Think a storm in Medicare and Medicaid will happen. BIG PROBLEM IS HEALTHCARE COSTS. Say no, we won’t pay for this treatment. The problem with healthcare is the cost of healthcare and the value of healthcare.

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/us/2013/03/07/cnnfilms-escape-fire-mopping-up-the-sink.cnn

'We need a whole new kind of medicine.'

'Root of the problem: we have a disease-care system, not a healthcare system.'

'Healthcare costs are rising so rapidly that they could reach $4.2 trillion annually, roughly 20% of our gross domestic product, within ten years.'

'We spend $300 billion a year on pharmaceutical drugs––almost as much as the rest of the world combined.'

'Researchers estimate that up to 30% of current spending on healthcare is wasted.'

TNH  03/10/2013 11:35 PM Report

I've watched and admired Charlie Rose interviews for many years. So I was expecting a useful debate on March 4 between Joe Scarborough and Paul Krugman about deficits, debt, when they are useful, when they are problems, etc. I was hoping that the program would help many understand the current debate in Washington and help us chart a proper course forward. Unfortunately, I was extremely disappointed by what happened. So for the first time, I went to the Charlie Rose web site to see what the comments were. There I found that most people were also appalled by what happened as well.

Charlie had the impossible job of trying to referee a school house bully trying to beat up the smart kid with glasses.

Macroeconomics 1.01 (very simplified)

But rather than repeat those comments, I’d like to take a first step in trying to help people understand the very basics of Macroeconomics. Because without some basic understanding, Washington can never make any progress; we will continue to ping pong from one extreme to the other depending on which party is in power.

Macroeconomic policy is usually implemented through two sets of tools: monetary policy and fiscal policy. Monetary policy is carried out by the Central Banks controlling the money supply. Fiscal policy is the use of government spending and taxation to influence the economy. Currently, the Fed is using monetary policy to help the current recovery. However, the stalemate between the administration and the Congress over fiscal policy is preventing fiscal policy from helping the current recovery.

The Federal deficit is the difference over a year between Federal spending (including the debt interest) and Federal income. Whether a deficit is caused by too high spending or too low income is the subject of much debate. Which side you are on of that debate depends more on whether or not you think government is the problem. The debt is the accumulation of yearly deficits over the long run. The debt is financed by the government by paying interest to the debt holders on the total amount of the debt.

In times of full employment (say 5 to 6 percent unemployment), it is important to minimize/eliminate the Federal deficit. Maintaining deficits in times of full employment can lead to inflation. Economists explain this inflation pressure as too many dollars chasing too few resources. Inflation pressure is why during the period of the second half of the 1990s it was so important that the government succeeded in controlling spending to keep the deficit in check and prevent inflation. However, in time of higher unemployment such as we have had since 2008, it is important to use Federal deficits (along with monetary policy) to help restore the economy to full employment. Deficits in periods of higher unemployment do NOT contribute to inflation. On the other hand, reducing federal expenses, i.e., cutting the federal budget, at a time of higher unemployment is counter-productive and actually prolongs the unemployment and thereby adds unnecessarily to the debt over the years.

So the Republicans who are advocating cutting spending today, while unemployment is too high, because of their concern for the debt, are actually contributing to the long-term debt problems. As Paul Krugman tried to explain in the debate, every $1.00 cut from the Federal budget today actually results in $1.50 loss in Federal income in the short run, thereby, increasing the annual deficit and adding to the accumulated debt.

I’ll admit that the Democrats and the administration have not done a good job in explaining the above basics. It is therefore, even more important that the media help us understand these basic principles, rather than just cover one side or the other of the debate over deficits and debt.

In summary, proper fiscal policy can both (1) reduce unemployment in the short run and (2) help make the long-term debt less than it would be if we try to cut our way to prosperity.

When are deficits good and when are they bad:

High unemployment – Federal Deficits can help restore the economy

Full employment – Federal Deficits can lead to inflation

Opposing all annual deficits will leave only monetary policy to help even out the cycles in our economy. A balanced federal budget amendment would preclude using fiscal policy, yet some politicians are advocating such an amendment.

StandupPhilosopher  03/10/2013 11:02 PM Report

Both Joe,Paul, as well as anyone interested in America's debt problem need to read a recently published book called "American Solvency" that breaks down in detail how a very simple constitutional amendment ("The Solvency Amendment") can completely change the debates about government spending in a way that makes them more constructive and forces those in Washington to take a holistic view towards spending programs.

This is a book that MUST be read all the way through to the very end–especially since it is an issue that carries with it a great deal of partisan baggage. Being “liberally bent” (although, I would say that I’m just a human being who thinks critically about things and is always searching for the truth behind all the sound bites), my experience reading this book is that I felt it was an idea that favored fiscal conservatives, until I reached the very end of the book. It wasn’t until I got to the fifth and final Section of the Solvency Amendment that I was able to see it as truly non-partisan and fully appreciate all the positive long-term implications this Amendment has for changing toxic the culture of Washington surrounding fiscal issues.

The author of the book also has a blog called americansolvency.net or http://americansolvency.blogspot.com.

MrVjillarston  03/10/2013 05:11 AM Report

I disagree with those who were critical of the show. These two guests were well suited for each other b/c they were political. They resorted to rhetoric. I don't like rhetoric b/c it’s a orator-politicians’ game used for prophetic statements that carry a logical flaw, which I will get to, but for me it was Platonically entertaining in a modern way. It was fast moving. And in such hyper-activity we got Krugman's absolutism--his 'appeal to authority' saying Summers agreed with him "on ALL this stuff" and then hitching Bernake to that; and Scarborough's 'appeal to consensus' saying only "a few [3] people agree with Paul".

I thought that both of these appeals were laughably entertaining, in a Platonic way--that ‘word’ arguments are not serious arguments.

Krugman's field status does not give him a pass on the moderator's point--that Summers had his own take. Krugman did not speak to the quote Charlie referenced. Krugman swithched quotes. So nice work Mr. Rose for checking the switch.

Both Krugman and Scarborough were making inductive arguments w/o a non-syllogistic logic for it. Expert knowledge or being well read does not matter in this context. They were both guessing. Even those reading this are as good as either of them at this point. That's b/c the dx/dt integral cannot factor 'black swans' accurately and therefore, any case for either side of this debate was just a belief that theoretical [non-existential] enthymemes can predict their particular case.

However, Scarborough did have an existential enthymeme that Krugman ignored. It was the progeny enthymeme. Our children will not have the 5-to-1 average ratio of [20th century] input to output for the 2025 debt. The 21st century will not be like the 20th even if 'black swans' do not occur leading up to the projected ratio for 2025. The 2025 projection is 2-to-1. The imigration issue might be a possible correction of some debt reduction if tweaked. If we give illegal immigrants citizenship it should be to the ones who will shift this projection in favor of debt reduction--like the President's executive [dream act] order that is now in place.

onevoice  03/09/2013 08:48 PM Report

In order for me to go with Mr. Krogman for his idea of not doing anything about spending cuts for 5-10 years in order to stimulate the economy, I would like to get a successful economy guaranteed from Mr. Krogman. Without a successful economy, the national debt will be a huge national security threat for our nation. It just like a family choose not to working on paying off the huge family debt when it is still payable in stead of waiting for the time that they loose job /income and credit. Additionally, I also don't believe a bubble economy which is created by government artificially. It is no different from a business runs with borrowed money without a good product. It can not last long. It is more like a Ponzi Scheme rather than a real healthy economy growth. Therefore, good and well targeted spending cuts is always necessary and never wrong for growing real good economy because it cuts the wasteful spending so more money can be used for real economy growth.

tarryd  03/09/2013 05:47 PM Report

I thought I would visit this thread one last time to catch to check out the comments. Not much change. Pretty much a total thumbs down. You had to know full well, Mr. Rose, that Joe Scarborough would turn the show into a shouting match. That is what he does most days on his own show. And your moderation was lacking. Well, more than lacking. You seemed to join in the attacks and interruptions that prevented Mr. Krugman from making his points. I know your new gig on the CBS morning show requires a splashy style but I think you can dial it back for your speciality, the long form interview.

misterjag  03/09/2013 02:28 PM Report

I think some of you are being too hard on Joe Scarborough. I credit him for gamely discussing the economy with Paul Krugman and hope to see Krugman make future appearances on Morning Joe.

rgmyers  03/09/2013 12:53 PM Report

As a longtime fan, all I can add to this chain is, "Shame on you, Charlie!" Scheduling something like this is an embarrassment and a disgrace.

fuckleberryhinn  03/09/2013 03:04 AM Report

Not to beat a dead horse (i.e. most of the previous comments), but this was embarrassing. This is exactly what happens when a featherweight gets in the ring with a heavyweight. Joe Scarborough is a bully who's use to the likes of airheaded Mika Brzezinski, and the rest of the clowns Joe has on his show every day, folding over and placating to everything King Joe says. I haven't seen a butt-whooping like this in a long time, and I'm sure Joe couldn't wait for it to end, although he's great at faking it. And Krugman, despite Charlie's irksome interruptions and Joe's macho bravado and constant cheap shots (circling back to take second and third shots at mini-battles that he clearly lost in the large war), managed to win on all levels: economically, intellectually, and by out-classing a guy who has little to say, but loves the sound of his own voice; a guy who desperately needs to be put in his place (I actually wish Krugman would have pinned him down even more at certain spots) and a guy who gets to go on TV for 3 hours a day, 5 days a week which has puffed his head to extreme proportions. I'm sure he's glad no one watches Charlie Rose. I mean, this was hard to watch. Krugman is like Rick Grimes and almost everyone else within the media and punditry are the debt-zombies. And truthfully, this entire debacle, obsession and phenomenon of debt-reduction stems from the fact that our president is black. Plain and simple. This was truly remarkable.

alexwalter  03/09/2013 02:45 AM Report

Paul made Scarborough look like an Orangutan. Wait: Joe already looks like an Orangutan. Now we know he thinks like one. Charlie used the well worn conservative method of two against one. He learned his lesson after getting a black eye after his similarly bullshit interview with Chomsky.

Massive  03/08/2013 11:43 PM Report

while I agree about the tone of the show as far as the hostile environment for Paul, I think he is to blame in several regards. For one he has a way of starting his remarks that often lets the other person in. I can't quite put my finger on it, but it is something like broadening each question to allow a broader point to be made (probably a better one) but it invites the other person in with more remarks since they feel their question is being reformatted, or possibly that a new subject is on the table.

The second thing is accepting an invitation to appear with Scarborough, who is a tool, and a politician, but an effective talker, so he is going to get Paul on style and blunt Paul's strength since he is not up to a discussion on substance at Paul's level.

The third thing is Paul's whole pundit and Nobel mishmash. I am not against his doing that, he should do whatever he wants. But the problem is that Paul could be a character like the pre crash Greenspan, an economist who's judgement is beyond question (for better or worse). But playing in a field where he often offers opinions on topics where he knows no more than the rest of us has similarly drawn down his prestige on even economics, when it remains the fact that he knows the subject as few others do and Scarborough might not even pass a first year mid term, so why is he in the room.

So Paul gets what he deserves, but I am not sure we do. I would rather hear the Nobel Laureate on the economy than see him in a verbal boxing match.

PWS  03/08/2013 11:38 PM Report

I finally watched this interview and was very disappointed in the discourtesy you showed Dr. Krugman. Look at the interview again, you'll see you interrupted him five or six times as often as you did Rep. Scarborough. And for the most part you cut him off just as he was trying to explain a point.

Krugman's views, even if wrong, are always well thought out, and like most well thought out ideas require some explanation to get across. Which he was trying to do. But when he didn't finish a point in a few seconds you jumped in as if he wasn't worth listening to. You also let Scarborough continually interrupt him, but made Krugman fight for space to say anything.

On the other hand, you seldom interrupted Scarborough. You let him go on and on about Krugman changing his views, never acknowledging that Krugman had very good reasons to change his views because the circumstances were very different. That was a particularly galling example of poorly prepared and unprofessional interviewing. And you let Scarborough, who had no economics training whatsoever, lecture Krugman, who has a Nobel Memorial Prize, about economics.

And, (admittedly this is a my own opinion and a pet peeve), you admonished Krugman with a column by Tom Friedman, who is an ignorant blowhard, only good at making obvious, unimportant, or incorrect ideas sound like the the most important thoughts since Plato.

Dr Krugman is admittedly pugnacious and can be condescending. You would be too if you were continually ignored or attacked by a large portion of the punditry.

But if you're going to have someone of his intelligence, education, and intellectual stature on the show you should at least give him the opportunity to explain himself in sufficient detail to get his ideas across, and treat him with at least as much respect as you treat a windbag like Scarborough.

All in all, I was very disappointed in your lack of professionalism in this exchange, and it makes me wonder if you're worth following anymore.

mariaphipps  03/08/2013 05:53 PM Report

I have watched the Charlie Rose show for many years and enjoyed very much the civil exchanged of ideas. Therefore, I was appalled by the rudeness of both Joe and Charlie towards Paul. It was painful to watch such behavior, not at all in keeping with the wonderful programs PBS is known for. If it was ideas you wanted to discuss, LET THE SPEAKERS TALK WITHOUT INTERRUPTION !!!

billrad01  03/08/2013 01:55 PM Report

I have been a Charlie Rose follower for a long time. When you do these kind of shows it drives me nuts. Let Krugman talk please. Why have him on the show if you are going to talk over him. It's a debate about IDEAS, not he said she said. I don't care who said what 10 years ago. I want to hear them NOW. Spending on people can get you in debt, or out of debt. The difference is how they FEEL.

tarryd  03/08/2013 11:24 AM Report

This sad show which has received a very negative review by the people that count....viewers.....was followed up the next morning on the Morning Joe show by a half hour victory dance by Mr. Scarborough and his team of syncophants. Jeffry Sachs being one of them. It reminded me of the old Imus vendettas. The obvious yearning for validation then extended to piece in the Washington Post the next morning authored by Sachs and Mr. Scrarborough. Same arguments. Same attack on Krugman. You can still on Friday find it on WAPO. Along with 5,000 plus comments. 90% were very negative. Unusual for the Post the comments were civil and well written. As we say out here over the Hudson and beyond the Beltway....ain't nobody buy'in. I am afraid the validation ploy backfired.

A great many of the arguments against the piece were not critical of the authors so much as they were specific in their refutations of the points made. It may be good for Mr. Scarborough's lead up to announcing he is running for Senate at some point, tho I doubt it, but for Mr. Sachs this is not a positive. He just went down a couple of notches in the eyes of many.

Today, Friday, Mr. Krugman wrote a very good piece about economists and their predictions. Not a direct response to Sachs and Scarborough but a none to subtle rebuke.

Mr. Rose, I have watched you for 20 plus years. I have the greatest respect for you. But please do not do a show like this again. We expect civility not blood in the aisles.

finalfantasytown  03/08/2013 10:41 AM Report

the debt that should be paid is the price for paying the period globally since lost second world war.

charliesheep  03/07/2013 07:56 PM Report

CORPORATE JETS; THEY AREN'T A FOOTBALL TEAM; ITS THE LARGE "SUCKING" NOISE RIGHT NOW IN WASHINGTON1 DONT TAKE MY CORPORATE JET; AMERICA! -USED AS BONA FIDE'S---EVEN NANCY PELOSI; WANTS A G.S.2 AT HER DISPOSAL 24/7 AND CHARLIE, WHO'S JET DO RIDE ANY WAY?

Subetei  03/07/2013 06:56 PM Report

Government spending is expansionary... reduction in govt spending is contractionary. That is mainstream economics and in every first year macro text book. It's true now and was true during the Reagan administration when the U.S. was pouring money into the defense budget. The UK is not doing well with austerity they are one quarter away from triple dip recession and their debt to GDP ratio has increased. All the austerity countries their debt to GDP has gone up. It doesn't even fix the debt.

ninthave  03/07/2013 01:07 PM Report

I thought it was interesting that Krugman is saying the gov't needs to spend to create jobs, and also references the booming 90's economy and admits it had nothing to do with gov't policy. He also openly states that that gov't just needs more money from US. I'm sorry, he is very far left ideologically and there is no example on earth of the type of economy he's talking about working very well.

tmst  03/07/2013 12:31 PM Report

Scarborough got much more time to talk than Krugman did, and Krugman was usually interrupted by Rose or Scarborough before he could make his point. This was as bad as the cable news shows, and not worthy of PBS. They never allow this sort of rude behavior on the NewsHour, and Charlie Rose should have stopped it.

Vgarcia  03/07/2013 11:25 AM Report

I saw this last night.. As a economic geek, we must understand Paul and his Keynesian view: the deficits must expand under high unemployment, as the public investment/expense will be igual to private savings and the economy will takeoff. Regarding the spending " problem" we had a revenue cut and the Bush tax cuts plus wars and PartB, explosive combination.

Gelles  03/07/2013 06:11 AM Report

CORRECTION:

"... when the power structure, evolving in the wake of Chinese and Indian economic growth, may solidify."

(to bad this correction is not possible via edit after posting)

Gelles  03/07/2013 06:04 AM Report

Tonight's show in San Diego is about the Harvard Business School's approach to COMPETITIVE production and pricing in the global market and American leadership tomorrow when the power structure evolving in the wake of Chinese and Indian economic growth.

One could say, it's all about money and military power a hundred years from NOW. With that in mind the Krugman show under discussion can be seen as nonsense, and Harvard's futurism can be admired.

arihalli (03/06/2013 08:52 PM), below, asks:

..... "how are we going to pay for future debt that he, Krugman himself, is requesting more of? I don't get it. Does anyone?

TO ANSWER arihalli, in light of Harvard's focus on COMPETITIVENESS, I suggest production and the pricing system we apply to it, combines with DEBT and how it's used, to allow America to fail as Asia takes over leadership of the universe.

But political and military systems, IMO, trump DEBT. We can with technology and logistical systems change production incentives from price centered rules to human values centered rules.

If we make that change, America can lead. If not, low cost production will dictate outcomes that IMO won't be pretty.

SharkswithfrikingLazers  03/07/2013 03:13 AM Report

Joe says:

'Look at the past decade. $155B surplus to $1T deficit with Bush. Bush takes a $5.6T debt and doubles it to about $11.5T. Obama then takes it up to $16.5T.

$10T to $11T added to our debt in a decade. That’s a problem.'

Paul says NO the collapse of revenue was the problem NOT SPENDING.

(Joe is right and you can't have a war without plunder even if that plunder is only cheap oil prices--which we still do not have. What $10T in revenue Paul?)

SharkswithfrikingLazers  03/07/2013 03:06 AM Report

Paul says:

“I look at my friends in Political Science who measure polarization and our political system is more polarized now than pretty much ever. It is more polarized now than the eve of the Civil War.”

(It is not "Jedi mind-meld" it is talking in Klingon. Klingons were darkly colored humanoids with little honor, intended as an allegory to the Cold War tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union (perfect). Klingon is the most popular fictional language by number of speakers. Our Congress is Klingon.)

SharkswithfrikingLazers  03/07/2013 02:59 AM Report

Paul tells us with 1990's growth he would be a deficit hawk but not an hysterical deficit hawk.

He tells us that we arrive when unemployment is low enough that the FED raises interest rates to head off inflation. Got to get out of the liquidity trap. The Fed has the pedal to the metal to get the economy going.

(Yes, what is that FED doing with all their programs? Let us not forget the $7T secret loan program. Will the FED bring us down and why are we trusting them like we did the bankers? Audit time!!!)

SharkswithfrikingLazers  03/07/2013 02:16 AM Report

Paul mentions several times that Simpson Bowles got it wrong about a crisis in two years.

From "THE MOMENT OF TRUTH"

http://www.fiscalcommission.gov/sites/fiscalcommission.gov/files/documents/TheMomentofTruth12_1_2010. pdf

To ensure Congress moves quickly to enact comprehensive tax reform, the Commission recommends enacting a “failsafe” that will automatically trigger should Congress and the Administration not succeed in enacting legislation by 2013 that meets specified revenue targets.

If Congress and the Administration do not act, the failsafe would impose either:

1) an across-the-board reduction of itemized deductions, above-the-line deductions, non-refundable credits for individuals, the income tax exclusion for employer-provided healthcare, general business credits, the domestic production activities deduction beginning in 2013 and increasing overtime to raise $80 billion in FY2015 and $180 billion in FY2020;

or

2) a trigger which reduced tax expenditures further and moved rates and expenditures down toward the levels specified in Recommendation 2.1, assuming such a trigger met the same revenue and progressivity targets.

SharkswithfrikingLazers  03/07/2013 01:50 AM Report

Yes Charlie, "incestuous amplification".

“Incestuous amplification” happens when a closed group of people repeat the same things to each other – and when accepting the group’s preconceptions itself becomes a necessary ticket to being in the in-group.

(Boy, have we seen this in corporate America up and down the ladder making to many corporate Boards.)

"I’ve already blogged about my Morning Joe appearance and Scarborough’s reaction, which was to insist that almost no mainstream economists share my view that deficit fear is vastly overblown.

As Joe Weisenthal points out, the reality is that among those who have expressed views very similar to mine are the chief economist of Goldman Sachs; the former Treasury secretary and head of the National Economic Council; the former deputy chairman of the Federal Reserve; and the economics editor of the Financial Times. The point isn’t that these people are necessarily right (although they are), it is that Scarborough’s attempt at argument through authority is easily refuted by even a casual stroll through recent economic punditry.

But these people aren’t part of the in-group, and if they do make it into the in-group’s conversation at all, it’s only by blurring their message sufficiently that the in-group doesn’t understand it."

(Yet the in-group is still Larry Summers who we learned watching "Inside Job" had his own incestuous amplification which lead to the the crisis in the first place?)

jplynch  03/07/2013 01:27 AM Report

Outstanding program. We need more of this type of debate and less of the one-way interviews!

NeilMacCallister  03/06/2013 11:26 PM Report

Wow! ..Democrat Joe Scarborough and Democrat Paul Krugman arguing "Where do0 we find the money????"

,,you Idiots!!!!!!!!!

cegoez  03/06/2013 10:18 PM Report

I love the USA! This is the only place in Earth where a total moron can be a representative, got his own program and sitting to "debate" with a Nobel prize winner and not feeling ashamed of his infinite ignorance and superficiality

Derp  03/06/2013 09:55 PM Report

1. As expressed by some earlier comments, this is also my first time feeling compelled to comment on this site.

2. I believe deep down in my heart that Mr. Krugman in fact deserves the Nobel Peace Prize for not punching that megalomaniacally pompous ass Joe in the face. Joe was extremely impolite, disrespectful and unworthy of any opportunity to debate on this show, whether it is with a Nobel laureate or otherwise. I expect more from you, Charlie.

3. Some of you turds who posted comments below need to understand what a teal deer is.

arihalli  03/06/2013 08:52 PM Report

Well, i have a sort of different take on this . I wish someone would ask Mr. Krugman HOW he is going to raise revenue by printing money. All he keeps saying is that by printing money and spending in the infrastructure we will make jobs. Well...how is that going to create growth? That only kicks the can down the road................addtionally, he feels there is no DEBT problem??? We have a acknowledged debt of over 16trillion dollars. And with future health care costs we know its well over 50trillion with some putting it at 100trillion. So....the question is: If the gov't is spending more money then it is recieving - how are we going to pay for future debt that he, himself, is requesting more of? I dont get it. Does anyone?

tabs  03/06/2013 08:26 PM Report

Now Comes Part Whatever:

Does Mr Krugman thinks that he can get away with saying that he first wrote about an "Alice in Wonderland world" in 2008 where "vice was turned into virtue." Mr Krugman mistakes amorality for an inverse Topsy turvy world where the facts are twisted to match the spin. Amorality first raised it's head in earnest with the ascension of the Clinton's into the WH in 1992 and their operating paradigm of situational ethics. Followed by Al Gore contesting the 2000 election where the rules about the 200 sum odd year process of vote counting was called into question after the fact. What we now have is the desperation of a Presidential administration and his fellow travelers twisting the facts to match their story. As they preside over not only a bankrupt ideology but a bankrupt nation. Thank you Mr Krugman for your observation.

RegularViewer  03/06/2013 07:17 PM Report

Post script to my previous comment:

When posting in the states as a Canadian, replies to my comments usually refer to my country as under the influence of a communist plot and therefore I can have nothing to contribute.

Although we did not actually have Joe McCarthy to fend off such an inevitable outcome, this actually is NOT the case, although we DO seem to care about the well being of our middle-class, sin though that is.

Also, in Canada, I have been a life-long Conservative.

RegularViewer  03/06/2013 07:03 PM Report

I agree with 95% of the comments here.

Scarborough waffled on just for the sound of his own voice, inadvertently admitting almost every Krugman viewpoint was valid.

Krugman tried valiantly to completely coherent, intelligent, well reasoned thoughts through endless interruptions.

As a Canadian, I thought if there's ONE place to try to find out if there is such a thing as intelligent Republican, it will be on Charlie ... they're no where else to be heard. Maybe there IS something to this party that so many Americans belong to.

Wrong ... just another confirmation that Republicans in general seem to lack common sense and any ability to get along. So disheartening with the government of your country in such a mess.

PubliusCocacola  03/06/2013 07:02 PM Report

I agree with quite a few other commentators - It is ridiculous to have a debate on economics between Paul Krugman, a noble prize winning economist, and Joe Scarborough, media personality and former politician. I found the whole thing kind of intellectually degrading and insulting, especially Scarborough's harping on past quotes from Krugman even after Krugman explained the change quite convincingly. Rose should be ashamed.

normD  03/06/2013 06:06 PM Report

The non-debate between Paul Krugman and Joe Scarborough was a waste of time. Mr Krugman deserves better! Intelligent debate should be between equally matched debators. In this case, Scarborough was clearly in over his head and simply outclassed by Paul Krugman. A debate between Mr Krugman and someone with more credibility than Joe Scarborough, for example David Frum, would be far more interesting.

economist  03/06/2013 04:51 PM Report

I'm quite a fan of Mr. Rose's show, but I must say I was appalled by the quality of this much ballyhooed debate.

Only in America can a Nobel Prize winning economist be made to debate a politician/talk show host - where is the intellectual equivalency in this?

Mr. Scarborough came across as a hack. He had absolutely no substance, was playing 'gotcha' for most of the night, as rightly pointed out by Mr. Krugman, and sadly, Mr. Rose did not step in and fix things - rather he even seemed to be gunning for Mr. Krugman, as if to level the playing field, perhaps realizing that Mr. Scarborough had no clue what he was talking about and was either completely in over his head or not being honest with the audience.

I realize that Mitt Romney pulled off somewhat of a surprise coup in the recent presidential debates, by for a time conning an uneducated general American public by about his positions. I hope this has not become the sanctioned and tolerated standard for Republicans going forward - disavow your positions when on camera. This kind of nonsense should not be allowed, and moderators should step in to correct parties who are distancing themselves from their positions or their party's positions on camera - Mr. Rose did not do this during this debate.

Quite disappointing indeed.

rwayneleal  03/06/2013 04:09 PM Report

Joe Scarborough comes across like he often does on his morning program - an ignorant bully. I actually learned something from Krugman's arguments whereas Scarborough continuously generalized about every aspect of the debt issue.

Miguel_Ruz  03/06/2013 03:55 PM Report

Totally frustating debate. First, Krugman is an specialist and Scarborough is not. It was a discussion between a physician and a patient, not between two equally prepared guys.

To be fair, a huge point from Krugman is about strategy and the difference between short and long term priorities and problems. This is not only a technical discussion but a political one.

supune  03/06/2013 02:34 PM Report

Both of these guys came out sounding like hacks to me. Scarborough came armed with Krugman's old quotes and his good points got lost in trying to use them. Krugman seemed stubborn and seemed to only be arguing at a rhetorical level. Next time, maybe Charlie should sit with them as they prepare. I was looking forward to the "debate" but was disappointed with what they brought to the table.

One thing that I wished Charlie brought up was to focus in on explaining the spending success and failures in recent history. Also they touched on something bad happening again to mess up the projected slow recovery, but Krugman never pointed out that we hit a bottom and the chances of something worse happening is less likely and Scarborough didn't spend enough time on cutting the military more--he would have won Krugman on that point.

What frustrates me on all these talking heads chiming in on spending is that there isn't enough criticism the perception that Congress and the President seemed ok to spend trillions on war and bailing out big banks but are now squabbling over billions in social services. It would make for good comparative arguments that could have gone into other areas of what is wrong with our government, ie, citizens united, the need for campaign finance and lobby reform. My perception is that the special interests get priority over the needs of the nation and strategically play the party leadership to gain advantage for themselves at the detriment of the economy.

One point that I really liked that Krugman said was about the strength of the markets not being as relavent today because there is an abundance of private money that is not being spent on employing people. But nobody touched on that there was seemingly no incentives for these healthy market driven companies to hire people even when it is very much a Employers market.

afm528  03/06/2013 02:27 PM Report

Agree strongly that this was disappointing and uninformative. WAY TOO MUCH CONDESCENSION on both sides. I'm a daily viewer and I would LOVE to see two intelligent, informed, RATIONAL and POLITE experts repeat this episode. Thank you.

David8911  03/06/2013 01:52 PM Report

I was looking forward to this show because the pairing seemed like such a bad idea. Charlie you must not like Scarborough very much. Too bad Christopher Hitchens is no longer with us. I would've suggested a future show with Hitchens debating foreign policy with Dennis Rodman ... for the hour.