Thread by @bronzeagemantis

I see a few replies here claiming Harvard or other similar skrewls are this Komsomol. This is wrong...short thred about this kind of "populism"...
While Ivy league & similar-tier skrewls have had decline lately; last few decades especially in quality of actual education there...

https://twitter.com/bronzeagemantis/status/1696627966795505920

This decline in education quality is similar across all colleges in USA (tbh you can get more rigorous education in Latin, eg at University of Manila). It's also true that especially since Floyd but also from before affirmative action has meant GENERAL decline in student quality.

That being said a lot of very smart people still go to top-tier skrewls in USA (also England, not to speak of France). But unlike France, the USA does NOT select "the best and the brightest" for leadership positions, and doesn't even select as such from best skrewls.

SO: most of what some call "the elite" but what is more correctly "occupational class" didn't go to Ivy league or similar; and most people who go to such schools aren't "connected" through secret handshakes as Populists claim, and have no position open to them in USA nomenklatura

Typical USA "occupational class" nomenklatura is Jonah Goldberg of Goucher College. He has a job in media because of his mom. Goucher is an enormously expensive college for dumb rich kids. A Ocasio-Cortez went to BU which is same, expensive school for dumb rich kids. Populism!

There's a great documentary about power-couple Huma Abedin-Anfemy Weiner. They are exemplary of occupational class: power-hungry, dim people, with vulgar, popular and banal coarse tastes, the life of a hicklib. You can look up their background. This is typical of this class.

There are many in occupational class who also went to "good skrewls," but they're not the rule, and it's a misunderstanding of rot of USA to think so: a Populist delusion of Important Men with secret handshake clubs in wood-paneled backrooms (Hollywood cliche for decades).

USA is a kakistocracy; this extends to its refusal to select its "elite" from the best skrewls; and when it does pick some from there, they're usually not the best. The rule is morons like Jonah Goldberg, Huma Abedin, and AOC, connected dumb rich who went to dumb rich kid skrewls

There are plenty of smart, capable and well-intentioned OTOH who did happen to go to Ivies or similar, including the good state skrewls, but who are systematically excluded by USA "power system"; they also come under suspicion for cretinous reasons from Populist Inc opportunists

Some genuine "meritocrats," as in tech, have done well financially but this doesn't translate into power or even influence. Few who do manage to get positions in government again come under suspicion from Populist-roleplaying idiots. Example:

Trump White House did hire some Populists(TM); I am told they made no effort to learn how govt. works, how agencies respond to incentives etc. Saw their job as saying opinions or playing Alex Jones on radio. When they predictably failed to achieve anything, blamed "Deep State"

There are conspiracies in various agencies, especially law enforcement, and much corruption; that said, the specific image of Deep State unity, and a conspiracy by "people who went to good skrewls" who foiled with secret-handshake-club brave Populists in WH is a self-serving lie

Instinctive jump to blame old Harvard or similar skrewls (and they deserve that name now) as some kind of conspiratorial training ground of a shadowy "elite" misunderstands America's problem today in a fatal way. Again the "occupational class" rule is people like Goldberg and AOC

PS for clarification I had to add "old" in the last tweet; I disagree with Moldbug when he talks about such schools and students as "elite" lately because affirmative action and declining standards mean that the rule in these places as well is lately becoming hicklib cretins.