The longing to be liked

This cracking book is missing something and the want is telling. Jeremy Paxman virtually discounts the possibility that people might go into politics driven by ideas or conviction. These being the spur politicians routinely claim, Paxman’s study becomes a detective hunt for ulterior motive or unacknowledged greed. ‘This fellow says he wants to make the world a better place, but let us find out what he’s really in it for’ is the gist. The quest is lively, the evidence often persuasive and the anecdotes excellent, but the reader ought to keep firmly in the back of his mind the undeclared major premise of Paxman’s whole enterprise:

Given that people are not telling the truth when they claim to be in politics to make the world a better place, why in heaven’s name do they put themselves through it?