Gideon Rachman, as an historian, should not be allowed to play innocent!

Sir Gideon Rachman’s “Sweep economists off their throne” September 7, ignores completely the question of who put some of the economists on a throne?

I am an economist and I have definitively not been on a throne while for over a decade I have been criticizing some of my not too smart colleagues for not speaking out against outright dumb financial regulations, while the Rachman’s of the world were quite eagerly helping to coronate these economists.

Rachman should not think he can get away that easily from his share of responsibility by just pointing fingers and joining the crowd screaming for Madame Guillotine.

No bank or financial crisis has ever resulted from excessive lending or investments to clients perceived as risky but all have been a direct consequence of excessive lending or investments to clients perceived as not risky, which turns the Basel Committee’s capital requirements for banks based on ex-ante perceived risk into a stupidity of epic proportions. In this respect, may I ask when, Gideon Rachman, as an historian, helped to remind the world of that?