Professor Nouriel Roubini is a “Dr. Doom” (source: NY Times) for our time. His forecasts are both analytically clear and terrifying, as in “I fear the worst is yet to come” (The Times, 26 October 2008). As such he provides a clear reference point against which to compare other scenarios. How does my view contrast with his?The Professor sees this as a long, bad cycle. We both agree that the global economy suffered the equivalent of a cardiac arrest in October, the second phase of the global recession (which started in late 2007). Beyond that, however, the Professor is Dr. Pangloss compared with me (but not in any other sense). Our views differ in two respects.(A) In 2006 and 2007 I believed he was too early. The Battleship America (and even more so the world) turns very very slowly. This was not a typical post-WWII recession, a rapid slowdown caused by accumulation of excess inventory by businesses, or the Fed fighting inflation by increasing interest rates. This is something far larger, and hence was slower to develop.(B) Now he is IMO too optimistic. This is not a cyclical economic event. This is a historic cycle, the end of the post-WWII global geopolitical regime.

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