In Which We Find the NJ Editorial Page Becoming !@#$% My Dad Says

A couple of days ago, the NJ Editors published this editorial, supposedly about policy that rewards the outsourcing and elimination of American jobs. Starting with the fact that this policy certainly isn’t especially new, we have this bit of cluelessness:

The country needs something more, especially if we are to create well-paying jobs for the future.

Instead, we have pro-government Democrats pushing more money from Washington. Now they want to bail out the spendthrift states tripping over their own excesses. We also have tax-cutting Republicans who fail to see the need for smarter, more effective investment in our infrastructure.

Neither will work.

Well. Wonder why they don’t know that some of the spending that Democrats were looking for was for infrastructure**? Or how about the energy policy being pushed by Democrats that would boost investment in a home grown alternative energy industry? They probably don’t know that since it doesn’t fit their tax and spend narrative for Democrats. But it does show them to be not much better informed than the talking heads on cable TV — except the NJ editors don’t seem to know how to pick a team and play for it.

Or how about this one — the waste of space over the financial health of BP. The *dire predictions* of BP’s demise at the height of the spill was unfounded cable fodder — breathlessly pushed by folks who hadn’t taken a decent look at BP’s financials recently. And by folks who don’t recall that EXXON is still alive and stupidly profitable after the Valdez.

This one is especially good — The NJ wagging its finger warning of consequences if the tax cuts don’t work. I guess we are not meant to remember that they actually were cheerleaders for these tax cuts — and seemed awfully certain that the economy and business *certainty* depended upon them. Of course, it is widely known that tax cuts aren’t an especially efficient way to stimulate an economy and certainly don’t have much to do with business certainty. But it isn’t exactly kosher for these editors to call for tax cuts warning of dire consequences for outcomes that were never likely in the first place and not turn around and warn of dire consequences if the magical thinking they indulged in doesn’t come true.

I shouldn’t be surprised by the prevalence of the Conventional Wisdom, but I still can’t quite reconcile the fact that people supposedly in the information business can expect us to find something useful about old-fashioned crotchetiness.

(** I was in California last week and saw the progress being made on the new eastern portion of the Bay Bridge. The suspension span portion of it is being made by the Chinese and sent here for installation. Sort of heartbreaking that we are apparently no longer in a position to build our own bridge components.)