For some unfathomable reason, the Washington Post printed an op-ed by English major Amity Shlaes on the front page of Sunday's Outlook section. Titled "FDR Was a Great Leader, But His Economic Plan Isn't One to Follow," it's another draft of her standard "New Deal didn't work" line, the one that has been throughly demolished. See Dean Baker for a demolishing of this particular bit of Shlaes' nonsense.

Now I have nothing against English majors, I like to read the occasional piece of English lit myself, when I'm not, like most liberals, re-reading Proust in the original French. And, of course, there's no reason why a smart English major and Yalie like Shlaes couldn't achieve such a high degree of competence in matters economic and historical that her economic advice to the President is worth featuring in the Washington Post.

But she hasn't.

If anyone should know this, it's the opinion editors of the Washington Post. Only six months ago they published an op-ed in which Shlaes opined that "[Phil] Gramm was right" to say the United States was "not in a true recession, but a 'mental recession' ... But no matter. Voters feel they are in a recession, and so they are, at least according to Campaign Econ." Actually, according to Real Econ, the voters were right and Shlaes and Gramm were wrong. The recession started six months before Shlaes penned that piece.

Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, I get a job at the Washington Post.