Posted on 2-4-2002

The Smoke Machine
By PAUL KRUGMAN, NY Times

Modern political economy teaches us that small, well-organized groups often
prevail over the broader public interest. The steel industry got the tariff
it wanted, even though the losses to consumers will greatly exceed the
gains of producers, because the typical steel consumer doesn't understand
what's happening. "Blinded by the Right" shows that the same logic applies
to non-economic issues. The scandal machine that employed Mr. Brock was, in
effect, a special-interest group financed by a handful of wealthy fanatics
— men like the Rev. Sun Myung Moon, whose cultlike Unification Church owns
The Washington Times, and Richard Mellon Scaife, who bankrolled the
scandal-mongering American Spectator and many other right-wing enterprises.
It was effective because the typical news consumer didn't realize what was
going on.

The group's efforts managed to turn Whitewater — a $200,000 money-losing
investment — into a byword for scandal, even though an eight-year, $73
million investigation never did find any evidence of wrongdoing by the
Clintons. Just imagine what the scandal machine could have done with more
promising raw material — such as the decidedly unusual business
transactions of the young George W. Bush. But there is, of course, no
comparable scandal machine on the left. Why not? One answer is that for
some reason there is a level of anger and hatred on the right that has at
best a faint echo in the anti-globalization left, and none at all in
mainstream liberalism. Indeed, the liberals I know generally seem unwilling
to face up to the nastiness of contemporary politics.

It's also true that in the nature of things, billionaires are more likely
to be right-wing than left-wing fanatics. When billionaires do support more
or less liberal causes, they usually try to help the world, not take over
the U.S. political system. Not to put too fine a point on it: While George
Soros was spending lavishly to promote democracy abroad, Mr. Scaife was
spending lavishly to undermine it at home. And his achievement is
impressive; key figures from the Scaife empire are now senior officials in
the Bush administration. (And Mr. Moon's newspaper is now in effect the
administration's house organ.) Clearly, scandalmongering works: the public
and, less excusably, the legitimate media all too readily assume that where
there's smoke there must be fire — when in reality it's just some angry
rich guys who have bought themselves a smoke machine. And the media are
still amazingly easy to sucker. Just look at the way the press fell for the
fraudulent tale of vandalism by departing Clinton staffers, or the more
recent spread of the bogus story that Ken Lay stayed at the Clinton White
House.

Regular readers of this column know that not long ago I found myself the
target of a minor-league smear campaign. The pattern was typical:
right-wing sources insisting that a normal business transaction (in my case
consulting for Enron, back when I was a college professor, not an Op-Ed
columnist, and in no position to do the company any favors) was somehow
corrupt; then legitimate media picking up on the story, assuming that given
all the fuss there must be something to the allegations; and no doubt a
lingering impression, even though no favors were given or received, that
the target must have done something wrong ("Isn't it hypocritical for him
to criticize crony capitalism when he himself was on the take?"). Now that
I've read Mr. Brock's book I understand what happened.

Slate's Tim Noah, whom I normally agree with, says that Mr. Brock tells us
nothing new: "We know . . . that an appallingly well- financed hard right
was obsessed with smearing Clinton." But who are "we"? Most people don't
know that — and anyway, he shouldn't speak in the past tense; an
appallingly well-financed hard right is still in the business of smearing
anyone who disagrees with its agenda, and too many journalists still allow
themselves to be used.

I found "Blinded by the Right" distasteful, but revelatory. So, I suspect,
will many others.