Ideology could use some help from Buddhism

I was reading Paul Krugman's blog today, and he had a little post about how conservative economists still want to keep the same policies of George W. Bush despite, as Krugman notes, how much those policies have contributed to our current economic crisis:

Thus, John Taylor — a very good economist, when he wants to be — insists that we must respond to the economy’s temporary weakness with a permanent tax cut. Let us reason together. Does it make sense to let one recession dictate tax policy in perpetuity? What happens if there’s a boom; can we increase taxes (no, because then the cut wouldn’t have been permanent.) What if there’s another recession? Do we permanently cut taxes again? Is there a tax-cut ratchet (or maybe racket)? Think this through, and it makes no sense at all...

Recession, recovery, whatever: it’s always proof that the Bush years should continue forever.

Of course, this is hogwash. Not so much because Milton Friedman and his economic buddies don't have some validity to their theories because they certainly do, but because these conservative economists have turned theory into ideology, the well-thought out into divine reasoning.

What's the problem with turning any theory, whether on the left or right, into ideology? A rigidity and lack of flexibility to the problems at hand. Despite the failed policies of George W. Bush, these economists still insist that there way is the best way.

Don't get me wrong, the left has plenty of ideologs as well-- Paul Krugman is pretty much an ideolog himself-- and I personally can sometimes fall victim to this tendency as well.

But my core belief in the end has nothing to do with ideology: It is to believe in nothing (I'm pretty sure I stole this from Zen Buddhism somewhere). What do I mean? Well, only when we believe in nothing, are we open to anything. And only when we are open to anything can we see the world as it really is. Ideologs and intellectuals are rarely open to this. But it is failing we all have some of the time...