Kissengeritis

by reestheskin on 23/07/2016

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Kevin O’Rourke refers to the “cocooned elites in Brussels”, which gets to the heart of the matter. The dignity of office can be a terrible thing for intellectual clarity: you can spend years standing behind a lectern or sitting around a conference table drinking bottled water, delivering the same sententious remarks again and again, and never have anyone point out how utterly wrong you have been at every stage of the game. Those of us on the outside need to do whatever we can to break through that cocoon — and ridicule is surely one useful technique.”

This is not confined to Brussels. I seemed to remember some comment about the dangers of academics suffering ‘Kissengeritis’ — they end up a hopeless amalgam of academic and politician. The antithesis of science is not art, but politics. Just look at all these ‘professors’ peddling NHS nonsense and defending the indefensible.

Paul Krugman: Of cockroaches and commissioners