During a Senate hearing to review the FBI’s FY2026 budget request, Director Kash Patel was forced to admit that, despite the law requiring it, he had no such request ready to review.
This surprising development came during an awkward back-and-forth with Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), the ranking Democrat and Vice Chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, which oversees and approves budget requests.
Senator Murray reminded the FBI Director that the budget request was legally required “last week,” and after the director responded, she surprisedly added, “And your answer is you just understand you’re not going to follow the law?”
Don’t sell yourself short. I bet you’re more competent than everyone in this administration.
I am only hesitant to agree because:
1: I have terrible social anxiety (yay autism and trauma)
2: I assume, at least, some of them are competent people… at… at least something.
That being said, I also cannot think of a single one who falls into category 2.
Hrmm.
Peter Thiel might be the most competent of the bunch. He built the Palantir surveillance network, and seems content being in the distant background while the other oligarchs act in the open. Hopefully, he isn’t forgotten if we have a French Revolution.
You can recognise your own weaknesses, that already makes you more competent than most government officials in most countries.
Not only are you personally more competant than anyone in this administration, but you’re also not a Nazi (I’d imagine), which alone already makes you better than any Republican politician.
The fact that you think you might not be competant at the job is one of the things that makes you more competant (because you actually think before you act/speak).
Its the age old problem of government:
Anyone who strongly desires to be in a position of power likely is not the kind of person you would want in a position of power.
I appreciate you saying that though. =D
Impostor syndrome is basically the inverse of the Dunning Kruger effect, as it is known in popular culture.
If you actually read the actual studies by Dunning and Kruger, and subsequent work based off of it:
Idiots consistently wildly overestimate their correctness.
… But people who actually are quite correct, quite competent… well they actually tend to self evaluate themselves as somewhat less competent than they actually are.
Because humility and a fundamental idea of ‘i could be wrong’ are foundational to a rigourous system of critical thinking that can actually allow for that true, detailed knowledge to be gained.
So, ironically, Dunning Kruger effect also describes more or less impostor syndrome, its just that that isn’t the aspect of those kinds of studies that pop culture focuses on…
So we now have a situation where understanding of the ‘Dunning Kruger effect’ itself is subject to the ‘Dunning Kruger effect.’
There are a couple evil yet competent people in the administration. Russell Vought is one, a hire direct from the Heritage Foundation. Another is Stephen Miller. Heritage seems to be full of actually competent yet completely evil men. But I guess that what happens when a majority of your funding comes from oil, gas, and now tech barons.