American Idiocracy
We have become a culture that celebrates ignorance
In 2001, I joined the George W. Bush administration as an Assistant Director of the Information Technology Services Directorate and Chief Information Officer for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Although a political appointee, I wasn’t a high-powered donor or political supporter. Coincidentally, I had worked for Mr. Bush decades earlier as a volunteer for his unsuccessful campaign in 1978 for the U.S. Congress. He was a newlywed in his first run for public office, and I was a college sophomore at Texas Tech University. After I peppered him with questions during a campus visit, he came up to me afterwards to ask who I was and personally invited me to join the campaign.
He didn’t remember any of that in 2001, so that wasn’t why I was appointed. However, a former Air Force colleague of mine worked in the White House as Bush’s deputy assistant, and he asked me if I was interested in serving the President. After responding affirmatively, I went through months of vetting and a couple of interviews, and before long, I was headed to Washington, DC.
The American public is usually aware of high-level presidential appointments that require U.S. Senate confirmation, or the appointments of big-name supporters or major donors to political positions. However, there are thousands of political appointments throughout government, most of which do not require vetting outside of the Office of Presidential Personnel; I was one of 1,798 political appointees to the Bush administration, and there are approximately 4,000 political positions in the executive branch today. These appointees serve at the pleasure of the President and can be reassigned or removed at will.
During my brief tenure, I served at FEMA, worked for the Homeland Security Transition Planning Office, a team assembled to launch the newly legislated Department of Homeland Security (DHS), was a charter member of DHS, and finally worked for the U.S. Small Business Administration as an “e-government” executive. Mark Forman, the Office of Management and Budget’s Associate Director for Information Technology (IT) and E-Government, called me his “utility player,” someone who could adapt quickly to challenging situations and help to bring stability and success to an organization. While I appreciated his confidence in me, it meant I never got to enjoy the fruit of my labors before I was whisked off to the next task.
While in the federal government, I learned that there were two classes of political appointees - those chosen for their name or reputation, or as a reward for supporting the campaign, and those who brought professional experience and expertise to their assignments. I was appointed to senior IT positions in the federal government because I was a technology leader in the military and the private sector. While on active duty, I implemented IT solutions for an Air Force science and technology center's intelligence unit. I helped design intelligence information architectures for three major combatant commands as a defense contractor. I managed nationwide IT projects in the private sector for a then-Big Five accounting firm.
My knowledge and experience proved essential when FEMA became a major player in homeland security. 9/11 happened about three months after I was appointed to manage FEMA’s IT systems nationwide, elevating my responsibility and visibility in the federal government beyond anything I could have imagined.
I should add that although many top-level appointments to the administration were rewards for political or financial support, that did not preclude the individuals from having some knowledge or background in the areas they were leading. My boss at FEMA, Joe Allbaugh, was Bush’s chief of staff when he was governor of Texas, and he was the governor’s “point man in dealing with disasters in our state,” as then-U.S. Senator Phil Gramm (R-TX) said. The vast majority of President Bush’s cabinet nominees brought expertise in the fields relevant to their respective departments. Many of them had served in government before and understood the unique nature of federal service. They were well-versed in ethics and professional conduct and ensured we were all familiar with the standards of performance and professionalism expected of us. Perhaps most importantly, we understood that, while we owed President Bush our allegiance, our first obligation was to the Constitution we swore to uphold. He understood this, too, and would never have knowingly put us in a position where we had to choose between our loyalty to him and obeying the law.
Every President-elect promises to appoint “the best and the brightest” to political positions in government. While the public recognizes that loyalty to the president and his or her agenda is a key consideration, we also expect competence and ethical behavior from the president’s men and women. But what happens when the litmus test is loyalty to the near-total exclusion of any other consideration, including experience, expertise, and fealty to the truth and the laws of the land?
You get a Secretary of Defense who never rose above the rank of major in the U.S. Army National Guard, never led an organization of the massive size and scope of the U.S. Department of Defense, and whose media career as a Fox News television personality was built on his disdain for the department he was chosen to lead. Since becoming SecDef, he has been embroiled in operational security scandals for using the Signal messaging app and other unsecured, non-governmental methods of communication to conduct official business, fired people with institutional expertise, and replaced them with loyalists, some of whom themselves eventually left or were fired, and has been called by a former supporter “dangerously unfit for one of the most sensitive and important jobs in the world.” Moreover, the accusations of infidelity, mismanagement of nonprofit organizations he headed, and alcoholism that dogged his confirmation hearings would have sunk any other candidate. The Washington Post weighed in on the asininity of his selection:
As for only the best people, Trump’s definition of that phrase is often simply the visibility of a television host rather than the credentials to do the job. He has plucked numerous people from Fox News to populate his administration, the most prominent being Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, who was nominated for one of the most important jobs in the federal government despite lacking the credentials as a manager or a defense thinker.
Trump expended considerable political capital to push Hegseth’s nomination through the Senate. The secretary has been a rolling controversy throughout his brief tenure, from the Signalgate mess, including the revelation that his wife was among a group of people with whom he shared advance notice of a U.S. military operation in Yemen. He has also fired several close advisers and made the arbitrary decision to reduce the ranks of four-star generals and admirals by 20 percent and general officers overall by 10 percent.
One former senior official, John Ullyot, professed himself “a longtime backer” of Hegseth but nonetheless wrote a piece for Politico decrying the “total chaos” and “dysfunction” at the Pentagon. “The last month has been a full-blown meltdown at the Pentagon,” he wrote in April.
Trump’s selection of Tulsi Gabbard, a former member of Congress, as the director of national intelligence was criticized because of her past statements of support for Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad and Russian president Vladimir Putin, and her lack of experience as an intelligence professional.
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., a long-time anti-vaccine extremist and promoter of dubious or debunked medical claims, is the U.S. government’s preeminent public health official as the Secretary of Health and Human Services. One writer described his leadership under the auspices of “the most science-smothering Administration in U.S. history.”
In his brief tenure, he has insulted autistic people, made false claims about vaccines’ dangers, and responded to a measles outbreak by touting cod-liver oil as a treatment. Moreover, Kennedy has faithfully carried out Trump’s war on science, firing thousands of H.H.S. officials and terminating studies, including into antiviral drugs for future pandemics.
Pam Bondi, the Attorney General of the United States, and the lawyers under her purview have been criticized by federal judges, including many nominated by Trump, for “very shoddy work. " One judge accused Bondi of “a bit of a temper tantrum” that was “worthy of a 3-year-old.”
Kash Patel, the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, has been accused of not taking his job seriously, scaling back the number of mission briefings he receives, and “spending much of his time hanging out with celebrities at sporting events.”
During a hearing before Congress, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem displayed a total lack of understanding regarding habeas corpus in the context of her immigration enforcement duties, and had to be corrected by Senator Maggie Hassan (D-NH), who offered a lecture reminiscent of a school teacher setting a wayward student straight.
To summarize, Trump has shown “disrespect for the standards that other presidents have sought to uphold in their choices for senior positions,” according to Dan Balz, the chief correspondent for the Washington Post. That’s not to say that he doesn’t have standards; they differ from those of any president in recent history.
They must argue combatively on his behalf before the media. Trump has nominated 23 current or former Fox News employees to serve in his administration, and those who weren’t employees were often frequent contributors to the conservative news network. Trump has always been about performance and appearances, so an administration dominated by telegenic, pugnacious people reflects how he perceives himself as appearing to the American public.
They must either genuinely believe his lies or convince him that they do. One of the best lines in the Marvel Avengers movies is the exchange between Thanos, the primary antagonist in the first phase of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and an alien known as the Collector. Thanos demanded the Reality Stone, one of the six elemental Infinity Stones, from the Collector, who said, "I told you, I sold it. Why would I lie?", to which Thanos replied, "I imagine it's like breathing for you." That captures my belief about Donald John Trump, perhaps the most prolific liar in presidential history. Cultural anthropologist Dr. Carole McGranahan writes:
Politicians lie. This we know. This we expect. Citizens know this, and anthropologists know this. But for many of us in the United States right now—anthropologists included—it feels like we have surpassed “politicians lie” as a normative or hegemonic sort of claim. Things feel different. Donald Trump is different. By all metrics and counting schemes, his lies are off the charts. We simply have not seen such an accomplished and effective liar before in US politics.
Columnist Thomas B. Edsall writes, “Donald Trump can lay claim to the title of most prodigious liar in the history of the presidency,” and political scientist George Edwards stated unequivocally, “Donald Trump tells more untruths than any previous president,” and “There is no one that is a close second.”
The “big lie,” as we all know, is that the 2020 presidential election was fraudulent, rigged, and stolen by President Joe Biden despite all evidence and over 60 court challenges saying his claims were “frivolous,” “insubstantial,” and “without merit,” just to extract a few choice words from the courts’ conclusions.
The “big lie” culminated in a rally in Washington, D.C. on January 6, 2021, during which Trump repeated his false statements about a stolen election and incited his supporters. He urged them on by saying, "We fight like hell. And if you don't fight like hell, you're not going to have a country anymore." This rhetoric led to an attack on the Capitol Police and a forced entry into the Capitol building by hundreds of his supporters. This violent event aimed to disrupt the certification of electors at the U.S. Capitol. Although the attackers were not successful, the outcome included at least 174 police officers being assaulted and injured. Additionally, four Trump supporters lost their lives, and several law enforcement officers later died or committed suicide as a result of the events of that day. The government incurred approximately $2.7 billion in costs, which included damage to the Capitol building, security expenses, and investigative efforts.
However, to this day, Trump refuses to admit the lie and uses it as a litmus test to vet appointees to his administration. As a result, those who went before the Senate to be confirmed twisted themselves into rhetorical knots to avoid answering senators’ direct questions about the veracity of the 2020 election.
By the way, the exchange between Thanos and the Collector wasn’t real. Thanos used the Reality Stone to create a false narrative, declaring, “Reality can be whatever I want.” That is a clear and critical description of our 47th president.
They must share his contempt for intellectualism and experts. Trump also stands out among presidents as perhaps the most intellectually incurious. President Clinton was known for his understanding of the inner workings of government and was very engaged in policymaking, demonstrating a practical grasp of complex issues. President Obama was similarly engaged in the details of governance and policy. Even President Bush, who was widely derided as unintelligent, was an avid reader who devoured dozens of books annually, with specific interests in leadership, history, and military strategy. A little-known fact is that, during the summer of 2005, after he read "The Great Influenza" by John M. Barry, a book about the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic, he was inspired to establish a national pandemic preparedness plan. President Obama expanded on those efforts with a pandemic preparedness playbook with specific actions for federal agencies and public health officials.
However, President Trump ignored or was unaware of these plans, claiming the COVID-19 pandemic was “a very unforeseen thing.” He was constantly at war with his administration's public health experts and vacillated between dismissiveness and concern about the effects of COVID-19. He proposed ineffective and debunked remedies popularized on the Internet, and despite helping to speed the creation of a vaccine that could have saved hundreds of thousands of lives, he went silent as vaccine deniers overtook his base of supporters. Studies show that post-vaccine COVID deaths in “red” states, where people refused to get what they derisively refer to as “the jab,” were 38% higher than in “blue” states, where more people were vaccinated. Ignorance has a cost, and estimates are that between 234,000 and 318,000 of the 1.1 million COVID-related deaths in the U.S. were preventable.
Nevertheless, Trump and his appointees have long been suspicious of experts and their words and actions demonstrate this. Vice President J.D. Vance declared in 2021 that “universities are the enemy,” and his statement amounted to a declaration of war:
If any of us want to do the things that we want to do for our country, and for the people who live in it, we have to honestly and aggressively attack the universities in this country.
The administration has launched a full-scale attack on elite colleges and universities, withholding critical scientific and medical research funds and other federal funding, challenging international academicians and students’ visa status, and threatening the non-profit status of some academic institutions. Their actions have made America inhospitable for the world’s best scholars, scientists, and researchers, and other nations are wooing these experts to study at and work in their colleges and universities, reversing “the flow of expertise into the United States that has been the norm for decades” and diminishing America’s global leadership in science and research.
Trump and DOGE-aligned “special government employee” Elon Musk have taken a chainsaw to the federal workforce, with 260,000 civil servants projected to be laid off or forcibly retired by September 2025. The loss of experience and expertise is incalculable, and there will be long-term consequences to government efficiency and public safety.
Law firms and legacy media have also been targeted. Anyone who can use knowledge and information to counter this administration is labeled an “enemy of the state,” a term that originated in ancient Rome and was used against those deemed threats to the Roman Empire.
This dumbed-down administration is the logical outcome of decades of conservative attacks on intellectualism and expertise; who remembers the late Alabama governor George Wallace’s rants against “pointy-headed intellectuals” or Vice President Spiro Agnew’s criticisms of "effete corps of impudent snobs" who were "nattering nabobs of negativism" toward the Nixon administration? Conservatives have persisted in the argument that “elites” in academia, science and technology, the arts, et al., are contemptuous of everyday American people, and are responsible for their woes, whatever they may be.
Anti-intellectual sentiment has risen to the point where, according to a recent Gallup/Lumina poll, only 36% of Americans in 2024 expressed “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in higher education, compared to 57% in 2015. 32% have “little” or “no” confidence in higher education compared to only 10% in 2015, and 68% say higher education is “going in the wrong direction.” Colleges and universities are seeing drops in enrollment in part due to this negative public perception, and they are being forced by economic pressures to focus less on learning for knowledge’s sake and more on workforce training for job placement.
As experts are pilloried, the spread of misinformation by the administration, aided by so-called “new media” allies on the Internet, presents risks to personal and public health, mental wellness, and the stability of the institutions that undergird our society. Don’t think that it’s not to the advantage of a government that is testing the limits of executive power to have a less informed, malleable populace. Consider the words of Thomas Jefferson on the criticality of an informed citizenry as a defense against tyranny, specifically the passages I’ve emphasized in bold:
Experience hath shewn, that even under the best forms, those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny; and it is believed that the most effectual means of preventing this would be, to illuminate, as far as practicable, the minds of the people at large, and more especially to give them knowledge of those facts, which history exhibiteth, that, possessed thereby of the experience of other ages and countries, they may be enabled to know ambition under all its shapes, and prompt to exert their natural powers to defeat its purposes ... Whence it becomes expedient for promoting the publick happiness that those persons, whom nature hath endowed with genius and virtue, should be rendered by liberal education worthy to receive, and able to guard the sacred deposit of the rights and liberties of their fellow citizens, and that they should be called to that charge without regard to wealth, birth or other accidental condition or circumstance.
As I reflect on our responsibilities as Christians during these times, I believe we must be fully informed so we can tell the truth as best we can. Our words and actions should be above reproach and imbued with humility, as we are aware of our imperfections. That means exercising discernment and wisdom, not allowing our emotions to be manipulated, and as Paul said to the church in Thessalonica, endeavoring to “test everything; hold fast to what is good” (1 Thessalonians 5:21).
The apostle John warns us, “Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world” (1 John 4:1).
Jesus told his disciples that, as the end times draw near, “Watch out that you are not deceived. For many will come in my name, claiming, ‘I am he,’ and, ‘The time is near.’ Do not follow them” (Luke 21:8-9). However, he gave us the best defense as the world descends on us. “For I will give you words and wisdom that none of your adversaries will be able to resist or contradict” (Luke 21:15).
Proverbs 4:7 advises, “The beginning of wisdom is this: Get wisdom. Though it cost all you have, get understanding.”
What could it cost you? It could cost you standing in your social circles, even in your church. It could cost you friends and acquaintances. It could cost you by bringing unwanted attention on social media. It could even cost you your peace or liberty.
However, I encourage you to choose integrity over the idiocracy that rules us and is attempting to assimilate us. Choose “the way, the truth, and the life (John 14:6).