I would like to know why in respect to the legal system,

“human institutions are populated by human beings, who are not necessarily to be trusted”

yet when public choice theory suggests that politicians are likely to maximise outcomes for themselves due to possible moral hazard,

“it ignores the role of political values and ideals”?

So those in the legal system are not to be trusted but those in the political system are? Or perhaps you are saying that political institutions aren’t human or populated by humans, which may well in fact be the case.

David, where have you been for the last 10 years?

And as you are a member of both trades, which one best describes you?

I don’t mean to be rude, and I voted for you in 2005 in Cambridge and I came to a talk you gave in the Keynes room at Kings to the Gates Scholars (I wasn’t one, but my friend John organised the talks) and I was duly impressed and I would vote for you again if I still lived there, but surely the irony of your sweeping judgement of public choice theory cannot be lost on someone of your intellect – the swing to the Lib Dems in Cambridge had a great deal to with the fact that Anne Campbell chose her career over her honour. She went back on a promise in order to keep favour with her party, and you won as a result. I would bet my £5 that arch-capitalist James Graham wants for this comment, that somewhere in your campaign literature for that election, you have taken advantage of the fact that, in this case, public choice theory was right.

Some politicians may well stay true to their “ideals and values” but as we don’t have a priori knowledge of this at the time of an election, it is impossible to justify a vote based on it.