People who claim not to be politically inclined become arbitrators between what is right and what is wrong. Within game theory alone, there are three or four journals, each with a separate identity. Harberger has recently emphasized that economics is a profession, like engineering or accounting rather than an art or science. There are some differences, though. Oakeshott establishes a distinction between a theorist and a theoretician.
Economists are both.
To pretend that we have the final answer, either as anthropologists or as economists, I think is a mistaken world-view. It sends shivers down my spine when some Nobel laureates see the maximizing calculus as true for all societies across all periods of time. Clearly, the relationships between economics and reality and between economics and policy are complex. Still, I would insist that in any policy debate, there be a person who speaks the economic language. When that vocabulary is absent you lose insight into avenues, alleys, ways of seeing and setting the problem.