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?”
I’m saving your comment because this was my exact experience, too, and I’m glad to see this silver lining occurred for others.
These people truly are mentally children, running around playing grown-up. Meanwhile, when I was an actual child, I was expected to be held to the same standards as grown-ups by Boomer parents (and as you likely know, autism + adults not explaining their social expectations = very difficult childhood.)
It’s been a trip to see high-level government absolutely sucking at skills that I struggled with for ages, skills that I have been made to feel bad about for lacking. I work harder any day that I go out into public, even if it’s my day off, than any of these privileged losers ever seem to. I have to be extremely mindful of myself - my posture, my tone of voice, my volume, my face (can’t have resting bitch face), on top of whatever other tasks I have to do, every second of every minute that I’m around other people. I’m also expected to be aware of and mindful of the feelings of those around me, so I have to also accurately rate their posture, tone, etc. Fail any of these things, and anything I say or do has a chance of being misinterpreted poorly. It’s fucking exhausting, and I wish there were more understanding and acceptance that allowed us to relax.
These are part of a whole set of skills - situational awareness, social awareness, self awareness - that the modern GOP appears to completely lack. They were raised without needing to apply them, and we can see evidence of their privileged backgrounds whenever they pull some tone-deaf stunt and still expect approval. Whenever I’m feeling down, I can remind myself that I may not be perfect, but at least I’m not as out-of-touch as they are.
Don’t assume that what you are observing government do has any connection with the developmental stages of the people involved. You’re not seeing their actual interactions, plans, or lines of authority. You’re seeing what they choose to show, which may or may not be real.
For all we know, it may all be a kabuki show to keep us underestimating them or to provide distraction from the crimes they’re committing.
Focus on actions, not words, and base accountability on that.
You’re right, there are definitely individuals who do it all as performance, like how Boris Johnson purposely made himself look shabby as part of his image.
I don’t believe that’s the case for every politician. I do, however, believe there are more “men behind the curtain,” so to speak, who we don’t see but who know exactly what they’re doing. Even if those on camera are fools, the people making up “the face” of the organization aren’t necessarily the same people making up “the brain.” Which brings us back to your point - it’s important to pay attention to more than the façade these people express. The oligarchs pulling the strings are well-practiced in this game.
… And I am saving this comment, as you have well voiced the madness of all of this experienced in particular by high-functioning / highly-intelligent Autistic children.
A short summary of how Ive felt much of my life would be: constantly being mocked and belittled by hypocritical idiots who are too stupid to realize they are hypocritical and have totally logically inconsistent worldviews, and inconsistent applications of them… as well as just that they are idiots in the sense of just being objectively wrong about most things.
…
Yeah, it is quite cathartic to realize that masses of the general public are themselves, and voted into power officials who… are just literally schoolyard bullies, absurd, malignant, anti-social narcissists who literally cannot concieve that they could ever have any flaws or ever be in error, who are actually incapable of empathy, of mirroring emotions of others experiencing or describing something that did not happen to them personally.
…
I no longer mask.
There is no point, and it is too exhausting to be expected to be some kind of mind reader.
If people can’t actually succinctly verbalize their thoughts, or express them in writing, that’s their problem, not mine.
Just say what you actually mean.
Use your words, and know what those words actually mean.
I am done learning how to be an interpreter for every different person I meet.
Idiots and the uninformed love bullies, they assume they must be bullying people that deserve it, instead of just whoever makes them feel stronger.
Oh my God…it’s not resting bitch face I’m just thinking… When I read that sentence I was like okay I totally get this person’s reality. I’m so tired of hearing smile more
It is why I wear a mask all the time now. I don’t have to remember how to emote correctly, which is very helpful since I am autistic.
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Yep that’s my experience too…Once people realize ilmy face does not = my emotional state, things are better.
EDIT: Wow, my internet dropped or something as I was posting this, duplicated a few times, and my clipboard has now just lost the text I tried to copy paste out of it… derp.
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This has been my experience… forever.
Not autistic, but light sensitivity, tinnitus and chronic pain make me look angry basically all of the time. And since I’ve had all of those since I was a kid, I’ve been hearing variations of “what’s wrong”, “are you OK” and “are you angry” for the past 45 or so years.
I now just describe it as resting bitch face and let people do with that as they will.
Also, “empaths” fucking suck. Spare me your vast insights gleaned from dodgy authors. I just don’t care.
Hahah nope… definitely a very much guy presenting guy…but I look pissed when I’m thinking and don’t realize it.
I think we might have a Anacyclosis situation going on here. It is an hypothesis that posits that civilizations are like animals - they are born, mature, age, die, and replaced by their children. Hopefully, you, I, and others who suffer from the Regime, will recreate the United States into something worthy of pride.
It’s an obvious metaphor with no predictive power, even if it were well-founded, which it’s not. To the extent they can be said to have lifecyces, civilizations have more states than what are listed, “mature” is ill-defined, and “children” makes no sense at all. And what constitutes a “civilization”? Are some forms of human organization civilizations while others are not? Because when I read scholarly works regarding civilizations, they’re almost always empires or imperially-structured religions. And there are countless people in world history who were fortunate enough not to have lived under the heel of such macroparasites.
Children, in this context, would mean new institutions that arise after the prior generation has fallen. Such as the American government after British rule had been destroyed in the colonies, the assorted dynasties in China, or the conquest of Constantinople by a caliphate. In any case, the scale isn’t particular important. The gist is that institutions become increasingly corrupt and ineffective over time, until fresh blood topples the power structure and replaces it with something that has vitality. Over time, the new becomes old and is replaced in turn. It could be decades or centuries, but eventually stratification simply weighs down a society too much for establishment leadership to continue. The loss of failing leadership is rejuvenating to the people, even if culture is lost in the process.
Obviously not everything would track cleanly, but that is fundamentally the case for anything that involves human action. Be it cults, empires, or households, deterioration tends to be a thing. It is just that the biggest of these have the most research and records, because they are too big and obvious to miss.