The key problem in public policy is not to ensure that politicians promise voters goodies, but that they don't promise them so many the government goes broke. Populism is a device for making this problem insoluble, not for solving it, a point omitted from the Book of Preston. I also urged them to watch Yes Minister. In all this I was trying, in vain, to get them to see that government is the way it is for a reason, which you can no more wish away than you can wish away gravity, though you can ignore it at your peril. As they run in circles with their hair on fire trying to put it out with a fork, let me try one more time.
Government is the power of the purse backed by that of the sword.
It cannot be anything else. All hands on the sword must swing it in the same direction or it won't land a proper blow. What I want is men who will support me when I'm in the wrong. Otherwise, he wouldn't be around long enough for it to matter that he was sometimes right. True, that's not very appealing.