What's particularly ... peculiar ... about economics is the degree to which specific elements of it have been so vigorously adopted, promulgated, and defended by certain sectors.

I'm still digging into the history behind Ricardo, but briefly:

- He was an ideological opponent (though apparently close personal friend) of Robert Malthus. Malthus strongly criticized Ricardo's theories, and repeatedly questioned their inclusion in the Encyclopedia Britannica, suggesting they wouldn't stand the test of time.

- Malthus himself became strongly criticized by Ricardo's supporters. Much of that present criticism focuses on Malthus's writings on population, though these largely focused on the poor, and expressed a viewpoint not much different from Ricardo's. But by focusing the attention here, Malthus's own criticism of Ricardo is distinctly underrepresented. Compare this with Helen Keller, whose notability to most people is her role as an advocate for the rights of the disabled. Her actual attentions during her life were in support of socialism. For some reason, that message doesn't make it into elementary school texts....

- Ricardo's principle work was his theory of rent, which focused attention on landowners and laborers, suggesting that capitalists would be left wanting in allocations of wealth.

- Ricardo's own wealth came from stock speculation and banking. He later bought a parliamentary seat, according to Toynbee (I'm not sure how unusual a practice this was at the time), and used his MP position to advocate for his political economy (as the study was called at the time) views.

- Ricardo's papers and letters were collected by John Ramsey McCulloch, and subsequently bought by Lord Overton, another banker. They're now hosted by a number of largely libertarian-leaning organizations including the Ludwig von Mises Institute and Online Library of Liberty.

Again: my working hypothesis is that much of economics is more a too for justifying allocation of resources to benefit a specific class than a dispassionate study of a system. Not a unique view by any means:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rajani_Kannepalli_Kanth

Rajani Kanth's major philosophical theories include:

a) that Ricardian Economics was merely policy advocacy in theoretical guise,[2][16][17][18][19][20]

b) that Economics is the crown jewel of the hegemonic ideology of Modernism,[2]

c) that European Modernism, whose derivates are capitalism and socialism, is the real grey eminence that has crafted the alienated misery of our epoch ...

John Kenneth Galbraith has some similarly damning comments:

Leading active member's of today's economics profession...have formed themselves into a kind of Politburo for correct economic thinking. As a general rule --- as one might general expect from a gentleman's club --- this has placed them on the wrong side of every important policy issue, and not just recently but for decades. They predict disaster when none occurs. They deny the possibility of events that then happen.... They oppose the most basic, decent and sensible reforms, while offering placebos instead. They are always surprised when something untoward (like a recession) actually occurs. And when finally they sense that some position cannot be sustained, they do not reexamine their ideas. They do not consider the possibility of a flaw in logic or theory. Rather, they simply change the subject. N one loses face, in this club, for having been wrong. No one is dis-invited
from presenting papers at later annual meetings. And still less is anyone from the outside invited in.

(Quoted in Robert Heinberg's The End of Growth).