There is not one rational voice in the lot of candidates or the media pundits who comment on the races. Neoclassical economists still hold sway over the rhetoric and what passes as policy deliberations. The Republicans (and Libertarians) remain dumbfoundingly irrational in their beliefs that tax reductions (especially for the already rich) are the route to prosperity for all. We have collected so much evidence that this is not the case but they stubbornly cling to that mantra. Of course the party was taken over by the anti-science, anti-intellectual crowd a while back so I guess this isn't terribly surprising. Santorum's recent comment about how the “smart people will never support”
US is so revealing and so terribly sad. But it seems to very much reflect the current state of the Republican party members' minds. They have become masters of rationalization in turning greed and selfishness into a virtue. All that brain power going to support what is probably the most destructive force on the planet.
Democrats don't get a pass either. Here we see someone like Energy Secretary Stephan Chu, a Nobel physicist, still playing as if technology (like clean coal) will win the day and we can get the economy going again. Economic growth is physically impossible and somewhere in that man's mind he has to grasp that. Real
economic growth depends on increasingly turning physical resources into assets that humans use (and use up). It depends on increasingly available energy to do useful work. It is NOT increasingly printing money just to say we have liquidity! In my mind that fellow is guilty of criminal deceit in not declaring the physical truth.
