"The Myth of Alan Greenspan"

...

'JESSE': The problem is not that Alan Greenspan himself may have been 'a hack' who was willing to say and do whatever power politics required... The real problem is that being a hack has become fashionable, almost de rigueur, and public policy decisions are being regularly distorted by hacks, economic and otherwise, who are willing to say and do almost anything to curry favor from power, but often dress those political opinions up as science.

And they are defended by other economists and media people and talking heads who also seek to curry favor from power, in a pyramid of intellectual corruption. I have seen this contagion destroy very large companies, and apparently that works for countries as well.