Turkish economist No. 1
Things come in and go out of vogue. Suddenly, it's all Canadian writers, Irish actors and French singers. No one knows exactly why the Australians, Scots and Italians are out, but that's the way it goes. Similarly with economists. Turkish is the new flavour. And, funnily enough, they're gaining fame in the USA, where they tend to lecture at the best universities and, this is worth noting, tend to be highly critical of the very free enterprise system that assures them freedom from want and fear. But that's economists. They're a dismal, capricious lot.
Yesterday, here, we highlighted Dani Rodrik. Today, it's the turn of Nouriel Roubini, Professor of Economics and International Business at New York University's Stern School of Business. 
He's hot right now because of his grim outlook and his warnings that a rough recession is slouching towards us. When not teaching MBA students International Macroeconomics, Roubini blogs at the acclaimed RGE Monitor, but don't go there if you're interested in YouTube clips. Instead, you'll get posts headlined "The US and global financial crisis is becoming much more severe in spite of the Treasury rescue plan. The risk of a total systemic meltdown is now as high as ever". Usability guru Jakob Nielsen would approve of the no-frills layout, but he'd surely have a few suggestions for breaking up the text with (short) headlines and other affordable decorations.
When Roubini writes something for the Guardian it comes, unsurprisingly, with the advisory "This article is re-edited for style and length by permission of the author", but there's no ignoring its conviction. "Not so much bail-out as rip-off" ends in a call to the barricades with "...it is a scandal that even Congressional Democrats have fallen for this treasury scam that does little to help millions of distressed, debt-saddled home-owners." Roubini is warning us that Hank Paulson is more interested in saving the banks than the markets, but who's listening?
