Krugman goes nutso?

http://economistsview.typepad.com/economistsview/2007/05/paul_krugman_tr.html#trackback
Sorry. I'm lacking the link to the original article in the NY Times.

Krugman is, of course, notorious for wild statements and accussations. He's a "loony leftist" though he is damn sharp and almost always has a point worth considering.

What I'd like to point out are the comments about the current crop of Republican candidates, which are the REAL story in this commentary piece:

"Here’s the way it ought to be: When Rudy Giuliani says that Iran, which had nothing to do with 9/11, is part of a “movement” that “has already displayed more aggressive tendencies by coming here and killing us,” he should be treated as a lunatic.
When Mitt Romney says that a coalition of “Shia and Sunni and Hezbollah and Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood and Al Qaeda” wants to “bring down the West,” he should be ridiculed for his ignorance.
And when John McCain says that Osama, who isn’t in Iraq, will “follow us home” if we leave, he should be laughed at. "

While I don't agree with the sentiment about Senator McCain, Krugman is right on the money about Romney and Giuliani: If they really said those things, they don't seem to understand that Islamism is not a Monolith who's sole purpose is destroy us. See this post (http://moaes.blogspot.com/2007/04/understanding-islamism.html) for details.

Specifically:
1. Giuliani is wrong when he says the Iranian "movement" has killed us on American soil. It most certainly has not displayed such direct approaches; the threat from Iran is regional, in the sense that it seeks to dominate the Middle East. A different movemenet has chosen to attack the United States: The global jihad that commenced with Osama's orders in 1998.
2. Romney, as much as I love the guy, is not correct in his statements. The Muslim Brotherhood is not working, as far as I know, with other Islamic movements, as the strategic goals are different. And Sunni and Shi'a groups are more focused on killing each other than working together to bring down the United States (unless people believe that Iran and Saudi Arabia are secretly allies, in which case our soldiers in Iraq are going to be dead very soon).



Dismissing them as LUNATICS, though, is over-the-top. It is unlikely that the Republican front-runners are as ignorant as they appear to be about this particular issue, in the same way it is unlikely that Obama and Clinton are really as stupid as they appear when they talk about Wal-Mart or free trade. It's called politics.