Worst Case Scenario

Back to the future?

Ross Douthat, responding to the economic crisis and the congressional stalemate, suggests a depression is the worst of three scenarios ahead. But read David Brooks as well, "Revolt of the Nihilists":

What we need in this situation is authority. Not heavy-handed government regulation, but the steady and powerful hand of some public institutions that can guard against the corrupting influences of sloppy money and then prevent destructive contagions when the credit dries up.

That's reminiscent to what I wrote previously, in "Conservatism, Neoconservatism, and Economic Crisis."

Photo: Florence Owens Thompson, by Dorothea Lange.