Cheaptalk.org Website Review

A blog about economics, politics and the random interests of forty-something professors. COMEY, THE NEW YORK TIMES, OBAMA AND THE LUCAS CRITIQUE: ETHICAL LEADERSHIP IN THE PRESENCE OF POLITICAL CONSTRAINTS. There is a socially optimal decision, the ethical decision, which depends on the true state of the world. The sender’s preferences depend on the gap between her decision and the ethical decision and on her “reputation” – more on reputation below. If the sender only cared about making the ethical decision, her problem is simple – she implements the socially optimal policy for the privately observed state. But she also cares how much support her decision gets from the two receivers.The sender might care about her support because it affects the long run viability of the institution she belongs to. Or she might just want to be seen as being bipartisan. So the sender’s reputational concerns may arise for ethical reasons. The receivers do not know the sender’s preferences – is the sender ethical or biased towards one receiver or the other? A receiver is more likely to support the sender the closer is the sender’s decision is to his own policy preference. The receivers’ preferences have a common value component. They might potentially update their preferences based on the information content of the sender’s Hence, the press presents “both sides” even when it knows one side is right. The press has a super high standard of proof for calling someone out as a liar. Obama gave McConnell veto power over announcing Russian interference in the election. He could have gone ahead and announced the interference himself at the cost of being non-bipartisan but he did not. Comey broke FBI and DoJ policy by commenting when himself dismissing the case against Hillary Clinton. But he went with policy by not discussing the investigation of Russian interference and So, this framework helps to unify the strategic logic behind the way different institutions and decision-makers operate(d). But it also