“Crazy About Money” is the headline over Paul Krugman’s column attacking Senator Cruz. The Timesman says the senator has staked out positions that are “fundamentally crazy.” Along the way he puts down the Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan, as a “con man.” But first Mr. Krugman attempts to sideswipe Mr. Cruz for having as an adviser a “a noted anti-Muslim bigot and conspiracy theorist.” The offending adviser isn’t named by the Nobel laureate in libel.

Which, let us just say, is rich. However unsavory a figure may have fetched up in Mr. Cruz’s outer circle, who could compare with, say, Mahathir Mohamad? He’s the erstwhile premier of Malaysia to whom Mr. Krugman used to give advice. Dr. Mahathir is notorious for claiming that, among other things, the Jews “invented and successfully promoted socialism, communism, human rights, and democracy so that persecuting them would appear to be wrong.”