🍸“Smashed Patel” Edition

Apparently the FBI is now being run like a fraternity house with a badge budget and an arsenal of weapons.

According to a report in The Atlantic, FBI Director Kash Patel allegedly spends so much time partying, drinking and disappearing that colleagues worry he might be unreachable during an actual national emergency.

At one point, Patel reportedly convinced himself he had been fired because he could not log into a computer system. Instead of asking IT for help like a normal person, he reportedly panicked, called allies in a frenzy and touched off rumors throughout Washington that the FBI director had been ousted. Much to the chagrin of many of the FBI rank and file and a majority of Americans, it turned out he had not been fired.

The article also claims Patel has shown up intoxicated, been difficult to wake up, missed meetings and frightened colleagues with erratic behavior. Security staff even discussed using breaching equipment to get to him behind locked doors, which is not ideal when you are the guy in charge of protecting the country from terrorism.

The most amazing part is that Patel was supposedly hired to bring “discipline” and “strength” to the FBI. Instead, he sounds less like a law enforcement leader and more like the guy at a bachelor party who insists he is “totally fine to drive.”

Patel reportedly spends a lot of time ranting about loyalty, purging enemies and making the FBI look “fierce.” But there is nothing especially fierce about a man who thinks a forgotten password is a White House coup.

Come to think of it, maybe America would be safer if the director was behind locked doors.

Clay Bennett - Tribune Content Agency

Rob Rogers - Tinyview Comics and Andrews McMeel

Rick McKee - cagle.com/mckee

Nick Anderson - Substack (and editor of Counterpoint)

Chris Britt - Creators

Dennis Goris

Michael Ramirez - Creators

Matt Wuerker - Andrews McMee

Pat Bagley - cagle.com/bagley

The Trump administration says moving the U.S. Forest Service headquarters from Washington to Salt Lake City is about “efficiency,” which is government code for “fire half the experts, close the research stations, and hope the forests manage themselves.”

Under the plan, dozens of research stations will be shuttered, regional offices eliminated, and much of the agency uprooted just in time for wildfire season, because wildfire preparedness means throwing the people in charge of forest management into organizational chaos. Isn’t that what Smoky the Bear always recommended to prevent forest fires?

Critics worry the real goal is not to bring government closer to the trees, but to bring the trees closer to logging companies, mining interests, and developers. Utah, after all, is the spiritual home of the Sagebrush Rebellion, where public lands are often viewed less as national treasures and more as a giant yard sale with elk. The administration insists this is about “streamlining,” but opponents say it looks a lot more like taking the ranger station, putting it on a U-Haul, and backing it directly into the opening of a woodchipper.