[PEN-L:1611] Re: Re: Lear

[Brad De Long <delong@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Bill Lear wrote:
>
>Oh, you mean the Marshall Plan that allowed European capital to flee
>therefrom in approximately equal amounts?  You seem to have
>conveniently forgotten that you have been shown to be mistaken in your
>naive beliefs about the nature of the plan, and that Cecco agreed with
>me that you are wrong on this, and that Chomsky and Helleiner are
>correct.  But then, perhaps you are just trying to "hide the ball"...
>

On the substance, I think you're referring to Marcello de Cecco's claim
that "US foreign aid was thus, from the very beginning, mainly used to
balance European capital exports to the United States," from Origins of the
Post-War Payments System, _Cambridge Journal of Economics_ 1979, 3, p. 59.
As I said before, I don't understand where this belief comes from:
somewhere between one in ten and one in four of U.S. aid dollars flowing
back seems a much more likely estimate.

On the style, the last time I entered into a discussion with Mr. Lear it
ended with a veiled accusation that I was a Nazi:

>[DeLong] Chomsky... makes it next to impossible for
>people unversed in the issues to understand what the live and much-debated
>points of contention might be. He clear-cuts the historical landscape.

>[Lear]You mean the same historical landscape that so often directs the
>powerful to turn to a Neue Ordnung to solve their problems?

So by Godwin's Law this isn't worth pursuing any further.


Brad DeLong