Jon does a great job at defending economic science against the forces of quackery that dominate so much of the local and national media. The true danger in the kind of rhetoric coming from some of our media “giants” is that economic ignorance is perpetuated, which typically leads to equally ignorant public policies. We saw quite clearly in the 1970s what Miller/O’Reilly, etc. kind of thinking can lead to–market and social chaos. Miller is probably too young to remember what happened the last time oil companies were ignorantly demonized by people who had no understanding about price and profit formation or how markets work. (O’Reilly has no excuse) We were given price controls, excess profit taxes, gasoline rationing, and market allocation schemes. The result was all domestic oil exploration coming to a stand-still, gas lines where people waited for hours only to be told that they couldn’t fill up, people stealing gasoline out of other people’s cars, and fights and shootings while people’s patience wore thin waiting in line. When people ignore sound science for quackery in the medical field the patient dies, when they ignore sound social science for quackery in public policy social chaos and economic misery is the result. To ignore reason, rationality, and the facts in any area of life is dangerous and is likely to have consequences that are exactly the opposite of those intended by anyone.