Links...

From Morning Rant: ‘What ARE [U.S. Economists] Looking At?’:
"It seems to us that U.S. economists in positions of great power to shape public policy and market expectations are failing to do their job. They seem to be stuck in U.S.- and econometrics-as-the-center-of-the-universe paradigms. We’d caution clients against following the shtick of economists calling for a steady-as-she-goes economic recovery and strongly urge them to deeply probe representatives espousing these views."
From a review of Raghram Rajan's book 'Fault Lines:How Hidden Fractures Still Threaten the World Economy'Professor Finds Many Fault Lines in Crisis :
" No democratic government can let ordinary folk suffer when the harshness of the market brings the party to an end, as it inevitable does. Big finance exploits what Mr. Rajan calls this "government decency" and bets accordingly."
From Bad writing: What is it good for? Via 3quarksdaily):
"Sadly, if bad writers have one thing in common it's that they're all firmly convinced that they're good writers."
That sounds like Dunning-Kruger effect "where people with low levels of ability in a certain field vastly over-rate their talents because they lack the skills to judge their own competence." More discussion of Dunning-Krueger in All Are Skill Unaware:"However, many psychologists have noted Kruger and Dunning’s main data is better explained by positing simply that we all have noisy estimates of our ability and of task difficulty."
And finally a problem that I face everyday Who Cares What the Experts Say? - The Democratization of Science (via 3quarksdaily):
"Yet the democratization of scientific expertise carries danger with it. If experts cannot be trusted in a world whose problems are complex, who do we trust? To many, it seems, the answer may just have to be themselves (or their social or political interest group). While it may have been unwise to give as much unguarded confidence as we have in the past to the experts on any issue, it is crazy to assume that our untested, "common sense," and sometimes skewed judgments on complex questions are an appropriate substitute."