Director Patel is doing great things at the FBI, but we need to temper our expectations. Our dynamic duo Cash Patel and Dan Bongino are doing yeoman’s work turning the enforcement wing of the Democrat party back into a legitimate law enforcement agency. But fixing what is broken at the “world’s premier law enforcement agency” is a bigger problem than any one director can fix.
Any organization can be made to behave appropriately with proper incentives. But world-class (or “world premier”) organizations will continue to behave appropriately, even when incentives encourage something else – at least for a while. The difference is culture – the uniformly shared values and priorities which employees fall back on for direction and stability, even when external pressures encourage deviant behavior.
Organizations with a healthy culture, police themselves even when leadership is lacking, or incentives are counterproductive. Employees working in a culture of quality, continue to deliver defect free products, even while management pushes to cut corners. It’s a matter of pride for them. Law enforcement officers working in a culture of “equal justice under law” continue to honor individual rights, even while their leadership is asking for lawfare. Again, it’s a matter of pride. But organizations with a broken culture, no longer police themselves. That brings me to the FBI.
The stated culture of the FBI is “fidelity, bravery, and integrity” – values intended to provide reliable criminal justice. Unfortunately, that culture has been in decay since at least 2001.
Director Robert Mueller politicized the bureau. He brought in partisan activists such as Andrew Weissmann to staff leadership positions, and provide moral guidance to the next generation of FBI agents.
Director James Comey corrupted the bureau by incentivizing dirty tricks, such as entrapment of the otherwise innocent, and the implementation of an “insurance policy” to undermine an election.
Director Christopher Wray weaponized the bureau by targeting parents, observant Christians, pro-life activists, and political opponents as domestic threats.
25 years of misguided leadership has hired, developed, and promoted a generation of FBI agents. Their minions now infest all levels of leadership, and the culture of the FBI has shifted from
- Fidelity to compliance,
- Bravery to careerism, and
- Integrity to manipulation.
It’s not that there aren’t any trustworthy people remaining in the FBI. It’s just that the bureau is no long reliably trustworthy. Where justice is unreliable, it is nonexistent. Agents will continue to pursue criminals, so long as they are ordered to do so. But what will their leadership do after the Trump administration?
When the next Eric Holder or Merrick Garland insists that the FBI undermine rather than defend the Constitution, there will be no “culture” to resist such inappropriate incentives. Few whistleblowers will have the integrity to come forward. Few agents will have the bravery to say “no.” No leadership will have the integrity to speak truthfully to Congress. Hence, the public will continue to distrust the FBI.
A healthy self-regulating culture takes a generation or more of consistent leadership to build. It takes a fraction of a generation for poor leadership to destroy such a culture. It will take at least a generation to rebuild what has been lost at the FBI. What has been corrupted by 25 years of leadership malfeasance, will not be corrected in the four years that Patel and Bongino have to work their magic.
“Fidelity, bravery, and integrity” will remain hollow words on a wall, until agents who value those qualities have been hired, rewarded, and elevated to positions of leadership. The road back to public trust, will be at least as long as the road to corruption has been. Will we have the electoral consistency to ensure steady leadership for the next generation? Or would we be more likely to attain a reliable justice system by destroying what is, and replacing it with what should be, in one massive demolition and rebuild?
Author Bio: John Green is a retired engineer and political refugee from Minnesota, now residing in Idaho. He spent his career designing complex defense systems, developing high performance organizations, and doing corporate strategic planning. He is a contributor to American Thinker, The American Spectator, and the American Free News Network. He can be reached at greenjeg@gmail.com.
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Good article. Would have been nearly perfect had you spelled his name correctly… it’s Kash.
Oops!