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> Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth reacted by posting the Times’ statement on X and adding a hand-waving emoji. > Hegseth also reposted a question from a followe

> Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth reacted by posting the Times’ statement on X and adding a hand-waving emoji. > Hegseth also reposted a question from a follower who asked, “Is this because they can’t roam the Pentagon freely? Do they believe they deserve unrestricted access to a highly classified military installation under the First Amendment?” > Hegseth answered, “yes.” I know this is old man yelling at the clouds these days but good lord if we could have government officials that aren't terminally online...

tombert 1y ago
All I want from politicians, and by this I mean literally all I want at this point, is my politicians to be smarter than me. That's really not that hard, I'm not that smart, this isn't an unrealistic bar for politicians to cross. I can say with some confidence that an alcoholic Fox News talk show host is not smarter than me.
- geeunits 1y ago
  The unfortunate reality is that the smartest people avoid politics.
  - generic92034 1y ago
    Lately they also seem to avoid science, to some degree. So, what occupation do they choose, in these days?
    - eep_social 1y ago
      finance and tech or wherever the money is best
- omnimus 1y ago
  I live in non english european country. One of our problems is that huge number of our politicians (including foreign affairs ministry etc.) can't speak english. Education is not bad here. You have to have pretty high level english to pass any university. I mean many bars wont give you a job without passing english interview. But if you want to do international politics its fine because politicians don't have any formal requirements. So next time you see EU parlament footage where people have speeches in their native language… it's not out of national pride or respect. It's simply because many of them couldn't do it otherwise.
  - qart 1y ago
    I live in India. Nearly all parties appoint literal thugs as ministers. Let alone English literacy and fluency, they are not even competent in their own language. Here we have a minister of Kannada & Culture, whose first language is Kannada, struggling to write a common word in Kannada: https://x.com/tulunadregion/status/1886675464221286414 https://x.com/tulunadregion/status/1886675464221286414 > I mean many bars wont give you a job without passing english interview. We have a very similar situation in India. But ministers (and their supporters) now take perverse pride in not being good at English. They use our brief British rule as a scapegoat for half the things that are wrong with India. The other half is blamed on Mughal rule.
  - deleted 1y ago
    [deleted]
- sdesol 1y ago
  > all I want at this point, is my politicians to be smarter than me I don't care if they are smarter than me. I need them to be smart enough to know they are not that smart. I don't expect politicians to be smart. I expect them to be good listeners and be the voice for the people.
  - NL807 1y ago
    > I don't expect politicians to be smart. I expect them to be good listeners and be the voice for the people. I want both. I want them to be smart -- not necessarily domain expert smart, but reasonably smart with making life changing decisions for everyone. And base those decisions on recommendations made by domain experts.
- platevoltage 1y ago
  He was actually just the weekend guy too. Just imagine, we could have had the weekday guy who said homeless people should be executed the other day.
- nebula8804 1y ago
  >I can say with some confidence that an alcoholic Fox News talk show host is not smarter than me. Well he was valedictorian at his high school and graduated from Princeton University. I wonder if the Pete Hegseth from Princeton is the same Pete Hegseth today. I don't know, maybe he got messed up somehow during one of his three tours overseas serving in the military.
  - zimpenfish 1y ago
    > Well he was valedictorian at his high school Without knowing the criteria (as best I know, it's not just based on academic excellence but other things like sports[0] and extracurriculars), it's not much of a claim. [0] Hegseth was a leading basketball and football player for Princeton.
    - nkurz 1y ago
      In the US, the valedictorian of a high school is typically the person with highest academic grade point average. I've never heard of it considering sports participation, although Wikipedia does suggest that sometimes extra-curriculars are now being considered: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valedictorian https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valedictorian. But given his age and absent outside information, I think the fair assumption is that he won because he had the best grades in his courses.
    - nebula8804 1y ago
      Others have explained what Valedictorian means: highest class rank based on academic marks. His father was a basektball coach, mother was a "executive business coach" so likely middle class to upper middle class. That excludes making large monetary contributions to gain admissions (ex. Bush Jr.) It really seems like his admission to Princeton was based on a combination of excellent academic performance combined with his athletic ability which is often a boost for applications in competitive schools like Princeton.
  - mcphage 1y ago
    Years of alcoholism does damage to your entire body.
- petesergeant 1y ago
  > All I want from politicians, and by this I mean literally all I want at this point, is my politicians to be smarter than me ... why? Ted Cruz is almost certainly smarter than almost all of us, and I do not want Ted Cruz to be a politician. Boris Johnson is exceptionally gifted, and Never Again. Rishi Sunak's as sharp a guy as you're likely to meet, but as the Economist noted, rarely met a bad idea he didn't warm to. You're giving a weird halo effect to intelligence.
  - tombert 1y ago
    Ted Cruz said that Galileo was persecuted because he claimed that the earth isn’t flat, and used that as justification about denying climate change. This is a lie at best, but more likely just idiocy because he never paid attention in history classes. I do not agree that Ted Cruz is smarter than nearly all of us. I guess I just want politicians who can make the most basic logical inferences and do the most rudimentary reasoning, and importantly it would be great to have politicians who don’t think that they already know everything.
    - petesergeant 1y ago
      > I do not agree that Ted Cruz is smarter than nearly all of us One of his Harvard Law Professors called him “off-the-charts brilliant”, and he won several national level debate challenges, so I suspect we’re working off such significantly different world views here as to preclude any reasonable discussion on this point.
pjc50 1y ago
Terminally online journos and terminally online voters got them there. It's remarkable how toxic that kind of social interaction turned out to be.

tombert 1y ago

All I want from politicians, and by this I mean literally all I want at this point, is my politicians to be smarter than me. That's really not that hard, I'm not that smart, this isn't an unrealistic bar for politicians to cross. I can say with some confidence that an alcoholic Fox News talk show host is not smarter than me.

geeunits 1y ago
The unfortunate reality is that the smartest people avoid politics.
- generic92034 1y ago
  Lately they also seem to avoid science, to some degree. So, what occupation do they choose, in these days?
  - eep_social 1y ago
    finance and tech or wherever the money is best
omnimus 1y ago
I live in non english european country. One of our problems is that huge number of our politicians (including foreign affairs ministry etc.) can't speak english. Education is not bad here. You have to have pretty high level english to pass any university. I mean many bars wont give you a job without passing english interview. But if you want to do international politics its fine because politicians don't have any formal requirements. So next time you see EU parlament footage where people have speeches in their native language… it's not out of national pride or respect. It's simply because many of them couldn't do it otherwise.
- qart 1y ago
  I live in India. Nearly all parties appoint literal thugs as ministers. Let alone English literacy and fluency, they are not even competent in their own language. Here we have a minister of Kannada & Culture, whose first language is Kannada, struggling to write a common word in Kannada: https://x.com/tulunadregion/status/1886675464221286414 https://x.com/tulunadregion/status/1886675464221286414 > I mean many bars wont give you a job without passing english interview. We have a very similar situation in India. But ministers (and their supporters) now take perverse pride in not being good at English. They use our brief British rule as a scapegoat for half the things that are wrong with India. The other half is blamed on Mughal rule.
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
sdesol 1y ago
> all I want at this point, is my politicians to be smarter than me I don't care if they are smarter than me. I need them to be smart enough to know they are not that smart. I don't expect politicians to be smart. I expect them to be good listeners and be the voice for the people.
- NL807 1y ago
  > I don't expect politicians to be smart. I expect them to be good listeners and be the voice for the people. I want both. I want them to be smart -- not necessarily domain expert smart, but reasonably smart with making life changing decisions for everyone. And base those decisions on recommendations made by domain experts.
platevoltage 1y ago
He was actually just the weekend guy too. Just imagine, we could have had the weekday guy who said homeless people should be executed the other day.
nebula8804 1y ago
>I can say with some confidence that an alcoholic Fox News talk show host is not smarter than me. Well he was valedictorian at his high school and graduated from Princeton University. I wonder if the Pete Hegseth from Princeton is the same Pete Hegseth today. I don't know, maybe he got messed up somehow during one of his three tours overseas serving in the military.
- zimpenfish 1y ago
  > Well he was valedictorian at his high school Without knowing the criteria (as best I know, it's not just based on academic excellence but other things like sports[0] and extracurriculars), it's not much of a claim. [0] Hegseth was a leading basketball and football player for Princeton.
  - nkurz 1y ago
    In the US, the valedictorian of a high school is typically the person with highest academic grade point average. I've never heard of it considering sports participation, although Wikipedia does suggest that sometimes extra-curriculars are now being considered: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valedictorian https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valedictorian. But given his age and absent outside information, I think the fair assumption is that he won because he had the best grades in his courses.
  - nebula8804 1y ago
    Others have explained what Valedictorian means: highest class rank based on academic marks. His father was a basektball coach, mother was a "executive business coach" so likely middle class to upper middle class. That excludes making large monetary contributions to gain admissions (ex. Bush Jr.) It really seems like his admission to Princeton was based on a combination of excellent academic performance combined with his athletic ability which is often a boost for applications in competitive schools like Princeton.
- mcphage 1y ago
  Years of alcoholism does damage to your entire body.
petesergeant 1y ago
> All I want from politicians, and by this I mean literally all I want at this point, is my politicians to be smarter than me ... why? Ted Cruz is almost certainly smarter than almost all of us, and I do not want Ted Cruz to be a politician. Boris Johnson is exceptionally gifted, and Never Again. Rishi Sunak's as sharp a guy as you're likely to meet, but as the Economist noted, rarely met a bad idea he didn't warm to. You're giving a weird halo effect to intelligence.
- tombert 1y ago
  Ted Cruz said that Galileo was persecuted because he claimed that the earth isn’t flat, and used that as justification about denying climate change. This is a lie at best, but more likely just idiocy because he never paid attention in history classes. I do not agree that Ted Cruz is smarter than nearly all of us. I guess I just want politicians who can make the most basic logical inferences and do the most rudimentary reasoning, and importantly it would be great to have politicians who don’t think that they already know everything.
  - petesergeant 1y ago
    > I do not agree that Ted Cruz is smarter than nearly all of us One of his Harvard Law Professors called him “off-the-charts brilliant”, and he won several national level debate challenges, so I suspect we’re working off such significantly different world views here as to preclude any reasonable discussion on this point.

pjc50 1y ago

Terminally online journos and terminally online voters got them there. It's remarkable how toxic that kind of social interaction turned out to be.