It's a pretty bizarre claim. How can anyone credibly claim that the housing bubble had anything to do with science? But I can see why the Wall Street Journal editors like this guy.
You see, people are betting that technological progress will take of everything. You can keep inflating and there will still be price deflation. Unfortunately, that's a rather naive notion.
Technological progress are not guaranteed. You have to work at it to ensure that technological progress outpace the bad behaviors of politicians.
It's clear that neither party in the US has the slightest interest in fiscal responsibility, not as long as it's a winning strategy to buy votes with tax cuts and free benefits. The only way I see to avoid the coming demographic and financial time bomb is massive economic growth, e.g. one or more of AI/robotics (replace most human labor), nanotech (make material goods much cheaper), and biotech (cure aging, radically reducing medical expenses and increasing productivity).
Bad behavior by politicians... who are practically at the mercy of special interests. AND bad behavior by many individuals who are always looking to cut corners* or are too irrational they end up forcing leaders to overstep their oversight boundaries.
