MICROBYTE: NOT SINCE STEVE JOBS AND BILL GATES WERE KIDS.

Talk about going from zero to sixty in 2 seconds!

Okay, as of last year, the Federal Government employs just over 3,000,000 people, so they must be forgiven for an occasional screw-up in the vast lower ranks of government. I mean, I once ran a pretty large company (obviously, nowhere near 3,000,000 people, but large enough), and I freely admit to making more than a few.

But Thomas Fugat, the person picked to lead the fight against terrorism and combating violent extremism, is more than a little embarrassing. 

Just to reiterate, Thomas sailed from grocery clerk to lawn mower to head of the Center for Prevention Programs and Partnerships at the Department of Homeland Security, all in a few months.

Before his big promotion, his whole career in government totaled four months as a special assistant in a sub-office somewhere in the bowels of Homeland Security.

I mean, we elect our Congress people, so if they're not qualified, we have no one to blame but ourselves. But where was the Human Resources Department here? Do they even one? Or did DOGE give it the old chainsaw? 

Now, I do feel a bit bad coming down on Thomas Fugat. I’m sure he’s a lovely guy. But, it seems to me that his job required a bit more rigorous scrutiny than, let’s say, for an assistant to the assistant to the assistant in a Post Office somewhere. 

Don’t you think it’s time for We The People to wake up and start paying more attention to what's going on in our country? ‘Cause, clearly, somebody isn’t.

MICROBYTE: DEMOCRACY IS NOT A SPECTATOR SPORT.

When you were in school, you may have learned that ours is a government of the people, by the people, and for the people. The emphasis our founders placed on the word people, as in We The People, was no accident. They believed that the key to the survival of their radical idea, the idea that people could get along quite nicely without a King, or a Khan, or a Dear Leader, was an informed and engaged citizenry. So that, as Jefferson said, when our elected officials go wrong, we will step in to make things right.

Apparently, in 2025, the majority of We The People are content to sit on the sidelines while our elected officials make decisions that will affect the rest of our lives and decide what will become of America. According to the Gallup pollsters, 70% of us say, often with pride, that we want nothing to do with politics. 

72% of us couldn’t pass the test that immigrants have to take to become citizens. 

And in comparison to other “developed” countries, the US ranks somewhere between 31st and 38th in voter turnout. 

If you’re keeping score, 38th puts us behind Azerbaijan and just ahead of Zambia and Kazakhstan. 

The bottom line is that democracy takes work. And it's time that We The People stop taking American democracy for granted, get off our couches, and do the work we were meant to do. 

What does that mean? It means that just voting for president is all well and good, but not enough. It means learning how our government was meant to work (that we can help with). It means getting involved, standing up, being heard, attending town meetings, backing a candidate, running for office yourself.

It means sobering up and coming to grips with the fact that where America goes from here is up to nobody but us, We The People.

ON TYRANNY. Twenty lessons from the twentieth century. (Timothy Snyder, Illustrated by Nora Krug)

(Editor’s note: Given the weight of the subject matter, Timothy Snyder’s prose and Nora Krug’s art, On Tyranny is a remarkably delightful, reader-friendly work.)

Ken Burns: Timothy Snyder is brilliant. On Tyranny is a must-read. A clear-eyed guidebook for anyone seeking to learn from history to help understand the present. It’s a manual for how to protect and preserve Democracy, listen, learn, be kind, and courageous. This stunning new edition, beautifully illustrated by Nora Krug, makes the lessons jump off the page and into our hearts, filling us with the urgent imperative: act now, before it’s too late.

Editor’s note: Insiders say that Chancellor Mertz politely declined a state dinner and, after a brief lunch, hurried back to Bonn giggling all the way. (That last part is unconfirmed.)

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😆 “The difference between politicians and diapers is that both should be changed regularly—and for the same reason.”

~Jimmy Kimmel

Daily Beast: Trump, 78, Posts Bizarre AI Video of Himself Rocking Out to Journey. (see it here)

“Always a fan of flattery, no matter how unrealistic, President Donald Trump shared a surreal video of an AI-generated version of himself performing Journey’s massive hit “Don’t Stop Believing” in front of a flag-waving crowd. Initially sitting at the world’s most patriotic piano in a plain suit, he later transitions to a red, white, and blue outfit to shred a guitar as cheerleaders dance behind him for some reason, before it abruptly changes to show Trump banging away on a drum kit. Fortunately, the creator of the video didn’t attempt to generate AI vocals of Trump singing. The choice of song is also a contentious one: After Journey’s keyboard player performed it for Trump at Mar-a-Lago in 2022, his former bandmate sent him a cease-and-desist letter which said, in part, “Journey is not, and should not be, political.”

(Editor’s note: C’mon, can’t a guy have a little fun while Los Angeles burns?)