I’ll second this; it is long, but it is definitely worth the effort. I’m glad I read it because if Patel is anything to go by, it shows just how inexperienced and ignorant of their responsibilities Trump appointees are.
In the interviews, many times, the FBI personnel would say, “We did things this way because [good reasons]. Now, we had to change everything because Patel, with no experience in this sort of thing, said so.” Agents who had no experience with immigration issues were given immigration enforcement responsibilities over everything else (“The FBI has never handled immigration issues before”), and basically put on the street as beat cops working with ICE, a position for which they had no experience.
Patel changed the physical requirements so as to exclude women. Sorry, Clarice Starling, all your logic and deductive reasoning and soft skills in getting information out of Hannibal Lecter mean nothing in the face of being able to do a certain number of pullups.
And the Five Eyes conference in the UK. Delegates were invited to Windsor Castle to meet with King Charles. A group photo with the King was taken, and delegates each got a copy, with instructions that it was to be a personal keepsake only. It was not to be published or distributed, so as to protect the identities of attendees in Five Eyes’ intelligence. Most delegates understood, and now have a nice, if private, souvenir. Except Patel, who posted his copy on social media. :headsmack:
It’s a long article, but well worth taking the time to read. I’d be interested in a similar article on Department of Defense employees, military personnel, etc. on how they regard the similarly inexperienced and unqualified Hegseth’s changes to their jobs and responsibilities.
Kash Patel’s real first name is “Kashyap”, and according to people who knew him in high school, it’s pronounced “kosh-yip”.
The fact that he calls himself “Cash” and spells his name with a dollar sign on his challenge coins, stylized with a Punisher skull with guns for teeth, tells you pretty much everything you need to know about him. He fancies himself a rock star or a gangsta rapper, and all this boring office stuff is just getting in the way of what he considers his “real job”, I.e. striding around in a fancy jacket like he owns the place.
Contrast that with Jack Smith’s testimony before Congress yesterday. Last night Rachel Maddow and crew showed segments of it and commentated like they do (you know, good analysis interspersed with five pals gabbing–and interrupting each other–over beers in the back yard )
Anyhoo, Smith was a freakin’ rock star. Republicans needled and practically heckled him, but he didn’t budge or waver. He is the veritable archetype of what an FBI agent should be.
But here’s what I’m getting at: Nicole Wallace commented that watching him made her sad “because the FBI used to be made up of Jack Smiths. That was the kind of person that made the FBI their career.” IOW his integrity and utterly nonpolitical, straightforward competence was typical of FBI staff. But all of those people have been fired or left on their own and the organization is a hollowed-out shell, i.e., Kash Patel’s baby.
Not just being unqualified and inexperienced, but the childish self centered insistence that they are the real experts at everything. All the grift, grasping, privilege, and corruption are their due. They are all mini trumps. Arrogant and and willfully ignorant, in service to their own greed and self aggrandizement.
Sorry, a bit longer than I intended. I got on a roll.
Didn’t the Citizens United decision say that corporations are persons that have a constitutionally-protected right to free speech? Does not the First Amendment specifically protect political speech?
Another example of how much easier it is to break something than to make something.
Trump must feel that the job he did bungling the response to the pandemic wasn’t grand and fail-y enough.
They didn’t go along with what he said during the Pandemic. Sure, what he said was stupid, wrong, and dangerous but he’s the smartest guy in the room and everybody should recognize that.
Inside the US he was able to replace experts with lapdogs to do his bidding and faithfully parrot his remarks. He can’t control outside groups so best to just get rid of them and create his own (Board of Peace) that he can control instead.
Classic Dictator behavior. I’m glad so many countries are ignoring or refusing to join the Board of Peace. I just hope external countries do the right thing, stand up against his foolish ideas, say no to his whimsical demands, and loudly refuse to submit to his obvious grift.
And, beyond that: AIUI, a company can refuse to do business with anyone, so long as they are not doing so based on that person’s membership in a “protected class” (e.g., age, gender, religion, etc.)
As far as I know, “felonious malignant narcissist asshole” is not a protected class.
“Environmental insurrectionists”??? You mean, rational people and scientists?
Typical of Trump and the MAGAs that they learn a new word (like insurrection) because it’s a crime they committed and then they like to throw it at their opponents.
Does Trump actually think that social media posts are official correspondence? What if Carney doesn’t subscribe to TS? He won’t know he has been disinvited.
The oral argument was fascinating, not least because it proved once again that the entire executive branch is brain-poisoned by social media and can’t distinguish between online and real life. …
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