I had decided last weekend to ignore Brian Lenihan’s comments about Irish economists being a cosy cartel unwilling to debate each other. We’d been here before: Recall Lenihan’s “national mediocrity” moment in which he implied that pro-NAMA academic economists were too scared of people like me come out and admit their views in public. And frankly, I’m more inclined to believe the Minister is engaged in PR spin with this kind of thing rather than expressing his true opinion.
However, I must point towards Fintan O’Toole’s discussion of Lenihan’s speech because whatever about being accused of being part of our national mediocrity or being part of a cosy cartel aimed at suppressing debate, I do feel compelled to clarify that I do not work for Trinity College Dublin but for Ireland’s leading Economics department, the UCD School of Economics. 😉