He's Honest. You Gotta Give Him That.

Like many others in the 1990s, I thought of Alan Greenspan as some sort of financial guru. It wasn't my area, really (still isn't, probably never will be), but he was one person for whom I was willing to put aside my core liberal inclinations and go with the free-market flow. It seemed to be working, at least for me ... I had a steady job and was getting along well enough; there seemed abundant, limitless hope for the economy of the future. I had plenty of other stuff to worry about besides macroeconomics.


Well, now the macro has, um, trickled down here to us micro types; it's all falling to pieces (though, knock wood, I remain employed and expect to continue that way), and Mr. Greenspan has had to come crawling out of his peaceful retirement and eat crow up on Capitol Hill.

I don't hate the guy, or even dislike him. He's not a smug, smirking, insensitive jerkwad like Phil Gramm, who seems to think anybody who isn't mindlessly happy continuing the status quo unto infinity is merely a "whiner."

No, Alan Greenspan came clean. He said, in effect, "I was wrong." And this is how he said it:

Greenspan called this


"a flaw in the model that I perceived is the critical functioning structure that defines how the world works."

I mean, dayum, that is elegant! He not only admits to being wrong about housing prices, the banking industry, the credit system and deregulation, he basically says he was wrong about EVERYTHING.

And at the age of ! 82 !, he's -- dare I say the word? -- articulate.

My family of origin had a few stock sayings. One of them was "Let's face it..."

Another was "He's honest. You gotta give him that."

I'll give it to him.

What the hell.