Director of Poasting

As bad as it is to have someone totally immersed in an Extremely Online network of goobers heading CBS News, it’s much worse to have someone like this heading the FBI:

A heinous act of violence. A faceless killer on the loose. A desperate manhunt. An F.B.I. director with a finger poised over the “post” button on his social media account.

These circumstances collided over the weekend during the search to find the suspect who opened fire on a Brown University classroom, killing two people and injuring nine others. They came after Kash Patel, the bureau’s self-promotional top official, reported on X that his agents had apprehended “a person of interest in a hotel room” in Rhode Island, acting on a lead from local law enforcement.

Little or nothing seemed to come of it. The person was released a few hours later, in an outcome that was awkwardly reminiscent of an earlier moment. In September, Mr. Patel announced that the F.B.I. had helped capture the person who gunned down the conservative commentator Charlie Kirk in Utah, only for that to be a dead end.

In October, Mr. Patel again jumped onto X to trumpet the F.B.I.’s work in thwarting a potential terrorist attack in Michigan, blindsiding Justice Department lawyers, who had yet to file criminal charges. The move infuriated some prosecutors, according to people familiar with the episode.

Mr. Patel’s impulse to seize the spotlight and publicize the work of the bureau under his leadership has revived questions about his competence and his future in the administration. It has added to the growing criticism over his recreational travel, his use of a SWAT team to protect his girlfriend and his handling of the Epstein files.

A+ lede.

And yet, there’s something even worse than having this kind of person as the Secretary of Defense:

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth refused to share video of a heavily scrutinized Sept. 2 military strike on a suspected drug boat during briefings with Congress on Tuesday. Mr. Hegseth faced calls to share unedited video of the attack, in which a follow-up strike killed two survivors, but said he would play it only for the House and Senate Armed Services committees. Mr. Hegseth added that it would not be made public. The U.S. military attacks have killed at least 95 people.

The most salient aspect about the orange man is that he is bad.