When Alan Greenspan left the Fed, he had nearly divine status in the eyes of the financial press and, I'm sorry to say, quite a few economists. In retrospect, of course, his reputation has faltered badly; whether or not you blame Fed policy for the housing bubble (you shouldn't), Greenspan denied the bubble's existence and even its possibility as it was inflating, while actively blocking efforts to tighten financial regulation.
But it's his track record since leaving office that is truly remarkable. He has been an inflation and debt fear monger, helping to make his successor's already hard job a bit harder — and famously complained about ungrateful markets that keep failing to deliver the crises he predicts. After a brief moment of doubt about the wisdom of financial markets, he went right back to denouncing regulation while proclaiming that markets get it right "with notably rare exceptions".
Now I have in my inbox a notice that as the Fed holds its annual meeting in Jackson Hole, Greenspan will address a counter-conference organized by a group called the American Principles Project. The group combines social conservatism — it's anti-gay-marriage, anti-abortion rights, and pro-"religious liberty" — with goldbug economic doctrine.
"What we call learning is only a process of recollection." PLATO
