September 13, 2025

[Of the fictional British cabinet minister Jim Hacker] Years of political training and experience had taught him to use twenty words where one would do, to write millions of words where thousands would suffice, to use language to blur and fudge the issues and events so that they become incomprehensible to others. When incomprehensibility has been achieved by a politician, so has safety.

Jonathan Lyn (1943– ) and Antony Jay (1930–2016), British writers, Yes, Prime Minister, vol. 1 (1986), Jay p.235

How successful are you at achieving good-quality incomprehensibility? Or do you think any old incomprehensibility will do?

Some excuse this as a necessity in a democracy where the public good can only be achieved by finessing the public’s opposition—a sin of which even I have been guilty once or twice.