The latest Bloomberg Businessweek features 92 pages of news and advertisements, but the publishers really could have wrapped up their latest issue after printing the first three sentences of the week?s first substantive article:

Mediocre ideas survive longest in government. In business, at least, competition tends to cull the lame and the halt. But in the public sector, theories, particularly when enlivened by events, can linger for decades.

Because bad ideas tend to linger in government, the magazine goes on to tell us ?we may be stuck for a good long while with what the State Dept. calls ?21st Century Statecraft.??

Those who don?t get the value of competition might want to consult basic texts on economics, including those cited here, here, and here.