Recently, a fleet of pundits, mainstream media types, and politicians have, to the point of exhaustion, been overemphasizing the academic credentials of Solicitor General and new Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan in a vain attempt to prove the claim that she is genuinely qualified to be a justice of the Supreme Court. This is typical, for it indeed is the case that most pundits, mainstream media types, and politicians are people who are easily impressed by academic success.
However, it has been and continues to be well understood by individualists that it certainly is not the case that stellar academic qualifications should be a sufficient condition for appointment to a position of significant power within government. Central planners may lack knowledge of market prices, sound economic theory, and business management but they rarely ever lack extensive academic accomplishments. Many are accredited mathematicians and statisticians. Yet, their scholastic proficiency hardly if ever prevents them from running economies into the ground. On the contrary, the possession of such official educational stature often serves as a source of hubris, enabling intellectuals to dangerously overestimate the extent of their aptitude. The history of the Soviet Union is most philanthropic when it comes to the search for historical examples of academic folly in economic management by the state. The same applies to Ms. Kagan. I couldn't care less if she could write whole computer programs with the predicate calculus or price options contracts with differential formulae. If she isn't familiar with free-market economics, she's worse then useless.
The point is summed up within the following deductive argument:
-Excellent academic credentials is a qualification that does not necessarily prevent a person from using their governmental position to intervene in the economy or to endorse economic intervention
-Qualifications that do not necessarily prevent a person from using their governmental position to intervene in the economy or to endorse economic intervention are qualifications that should not be considered as sufficient conditions for appointment to positions of significant power within the government
-Therefore, excellent academic credentials is a qualification that should not be considered as a sufficient condition for an appointment to a position of significant power within the government
ML - Your logic is undisputable but your words will not stop Ms. Kagen from using the SC to force her lifestyle vision upon us. It seems to me the electorate are getting what they asked for, good and hard (to paraphrase HL Mencken).
ReplyDeletePerhaps its time for deeds not words. Lets start by not participating in the political farce. Don't vote, it only encourages them (that was HLM also).