Blake Hounshell at Politico Magazine published “Confessions of a Russiagate Skeptic” recently, in an attempt, perhaps, to excuse his failure to take seriously the threat that Trump could have conspired with Russia. HIs reasoning:
I keep coming back to the slapdash nature of Trump’s 2016 operation, and the chaos and dysfunction that everyone who covered that campaign saw play out each day. Like the Trump White House, the Trump campaign was a viper’s nest of incompetence and intrigue, with aides leaking viciously against one another almost daily. So much damaging information poured out of Trump Tower that it’s hard to believe a conspiracy to collude with Moscow to win the election never went public. If there was such a conspiracy, it must have been a very closely guarded secret.
Then there’s the Trump factor to consider. Here’s a man who seems to share every thought that enters his head, almost as soon as he enters it. He loves nothing more than to brag about himself, and he’s proven remarkably indiscreet in the phone calls he makes with “friends” during his Executive Time—friends who promptly share the contents of those conversations with D.C. reporters. If Trump had cooked up a scheme to provide some favor to Putin in exchange for his election, wouldn’t he be tempted to boast about it to someone?
Just like he bragged about paying off Stormy Daniels? Or publicly discussed his mob connections? The same media now wringing their hands over missing the obvious Russian connections loudly touted every false claim in Clinton Cash without a qualm.
And they are compounding their error by assuming that the know-nothing, loudmouthed braggart currently occupying the Oval Office is simply incapable of conspiring with Russia and keeping quiet about it. Bullshit. Just because he lacks knowledge and ability in one area does not mean he cannot competently keep his mouth shut while participating in a criminal enterprise.
Sadly, his knowledge of how to purchase mob-poured-concrete and ability to keep quiet about his Mafia connections and mistress payoffs do him no good in filling the responsibilities of the presidency. It isn't just that he doesn’t know anything about those responsibilities, but that what he is sure he does know is wrong.
According to David Dunning:
Psychological research suggests that people, in general, suffer from what has become known as the Dunning-Kruger Effect. They have little insight about the cracks and holes in their expertise. In studies in my research lab, people with severe gaps in knowledge and expertise typically fail to recognize how little they know and how badly they perform. To sum it up, the knowledge and intelligence that are required to be good at a task are often the same qualities needed to recognize that one is not good at that task—and if one lacks such knowledge and intelligence, one remains ignorant that one is not good at that task. This includes political judgment.
Dunning continues to explain that it isn’t a lack of information that causes the problem, but rather an abundance of misinformation. Take Trump's performance at one of the debates with Hillary Clinton when he blamed her, as a senator, for allowing him to get away with paying no taxes. He made his accusation with the smug certainty of the uninformed. He had no idea that fiscal bills originated in the House, not the Senate. And he didn’t know that he didn’t know. The same smug confident ignorance reappears regularly, as in his tweet that claiming that “The Dems had all three branches of government back in 2008-2011.” He did not know that he did not know what the three branches of the government are.
And as he continues to bumble his way through crisis after self-inflicted crisis, he does it with the same powerful lack of expertise. The man is an idiot who has no desire to change his status because he is unaware of it. Every day Fox News confirms his deepest beliefs in his fondest fantasies. Yes, Clinton sold all of America’s uranium to the Russians and yes, Obama gave $1.7 billion in cash to Iran for no reason at all!!! Somebody at DOJ should investigate!!! His facts are false and his head is full of them. He is the president of the United States and the walking, talking embodiment of the Dunning-Kruger Effect.
But he isn’t the only true believer. His supporters, and there are far too many, are also victims of this avalanche of misinformation. CNN interviewed a Florida woman who was the Facebook moderator for a group of Trump supporters that was infiltrated by an indicted Russian. She is sure she was not influenced by the Russians.
She does not know what she does not know, and her head is so full of what she does know that there is no room for reality to shine any light. Meanwhile, there is an entire right-wing media that produces and feeds the growing demand for this alternate fact-driven universe. Over the years they have moved from slightly shading the truth to outright lying. Someday soon we will see the indictments come down for Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. Oh, and Susan Rice. And that FBI agent that started that secret society. This steady stream of misinformation from outlets like Fox and Breitbart will continue to provide a solid 30 percent of the population that will be too politically stupid to know how stupid they are.
John Cleese put it best while discussing the Dunning-Kruger effect and people who watch Fox News:
“The problem with people like this is that they are so stupid that they have no idea how stupid they are. You see, if you’re very, very stupid, how can you possibly realize that you’re very, very stupid, you’d have to be relatively intelligent to realize how stupid you are.”
And as easy as it is to laugh and point at those who watch a network that enhances its’ viewers stupidity, one should never lose sight of the fact that the Dunning-Kruger Effect is at work across party lines. We are all subject to it.
But here is the real challenge: How can we learn to recognize our own ignorance and misbeliefs? To begin with, imagine that you are part of a small group that needs to make a decision about some matter of importance. Behavioral scientists often recommend that small groups appoint someone to serve as a devil’s advocate—a person whose job is to question and criticize the group’s logic. While this approach can prolong group discussions, irritate the group, and be uncomfortable, the decisions that groups ultimately reach are usually more accurate and more solidly grounded than they otherwise would be.
For individuals, the trick is to be your own devil’s advocate: to think through how your favored conclusions might be misguided; to ask yourself how you might be wrong, or how things might turn out differently from what you expect.
What has been haunting me for the last few months is that devil’s advocate sitting on my shoulder whispering in my ear: The GOP now has control (regardless of how that control was gained) of the legislative and executive branches of the government. Do they not have the right to implement their preferred policies and regulations? Would we not want that privilege if the positions were reversed?
(I honestly don’t know. Granted, as Democrats we tend to govern from the center (the New Deal being my definition of the center) with a leftward lean, and the Republicans appear to be governing as anarchists whose main intent is the destruction of the institutions of the federal government other than the Department of Defense. So, no, I don’t think we would want the opportunity to destroy the government we wish to serve.)
But that discussion really isn’t the point. The point is our ability to take a step back and play devil’s advocate even if only in our own mind, to seek out the gaps in our own stupid. Because we all suffer from the stupid, it is just a matter of degree and awareness. We have to become aware, and we have to seek out the cracks and gaps in what we think we know—lest we, too, attempt to watch an eclipse of the sun with naked eyes.