America is, perhaps, unique in the world for not listening to experts in nearly ever aspect of its national endeavors. Our experts on drugs and crime tell us that Prohibition doesn’t work, and we not only do the opposite of what they recommend, we double down on what doesn’t work. The same is true for every other aspect of the criminal justice system, foreign policy, economics, or any other subject upon which there is expertise. We reelected a leader who made decisions by praying that his gut hunches were right, and who continued to follow them even though things turned out not only to be wrong, but disasterously wrong.
We seem to be in the grip of the idea that God looks out for drunks, fools and the U.S.A. And we conduct ourselves as if we can do no wrong because we are so blessed. This belief in our own natural superiority leads to a kind of triumphalism and exceptionalism which allows us to justify the otherwise unjustifiable, from Manifest Destiny to Abu Ghraib; and from slavery to believing that America is above international law.
Naturally, when one begins with such intellectual limitations, it becomes difficult to maintain any semblance of intellectual integrity. So, of course, anyone who points out their stupidity is being disloyal to the cause, and can safely be dismissed as arrogant and condescending. This, of course, is an ad hominem fallacy, and inadmissable in principled discourse. But here, intellectual honesty has long since been abandoned in favor of paying reverence to self-serving platitudes and cant.