It should come as no surprise that someone in the Trump administration would give self-serving advice, on a stage, with probably a bunch of people eating it up. But here we are.
Karoline Leavitt said at an event with TPUSA in early April that a predecessor told her to “always be the most well-read person in the room.” She said she always tries to follow it, but President Trump always has her beat (insert gigantic eye roll). Newsflash: watching Fox News and other far-right wing entertainment channels doesn’t make you well-read or well-informed; quite the opposite.
“Well-read” implies that someone has read a lot of books, articles, and maybe even (gasp!) research from qualified professionals in order to gain a plethora of knowledge on different topics. It’s reasonable that someone well-read would understand different perspectives, lessons from historical events, and have a finger on the pulse of important topics in current events.
I’d say that someone who is well-read is, in fact, quite intelligent. It feels reasonable to advise people to bring a diverse range of knowledge—backed by reliable sources—into conversations. Being well-read is certainly an honorable thing to strive towards; that’s not my issue here.
What gets me is the part about being the BEST at it.
Why does one have to aim to be ahead of others? Why not just BE WELL-READ?
And herein lies one of the biggest problems with this whole administration: ego.
That’s their hook. Be the best. They have to measure their success by comparing against others. They can’t just recommend that people read multiple news sources to make sure facts are checked (which she does mention later in the interview, laughably, considering the blatant lies and dismissal of journalists that she regularly spews to the American public). But she felt the need to include that being AHEAD of others in the room is important, and it makes me sick.
In prioritizing superiority over others, the goal of being knowledgeable for the sake of integrity is lost. So as long as you’re “better” than the people you’re with, you’re set? It’s not for the sake of truth, honesty, and doing what’s right based on facts that are real?
This is a common theme with them. It can’t possibly just be, “We had a great crowd.” It has to be the biggest crowd ever seen, and certainly bigger than Obama or MLK Jr. They can’t simply promote their perceived successes, they have to describe Trump as the greatest president who ever lived, every single time. Give me a fucking break.
They waste so many words on self-congratulation. Even after allegedly catching the potential shooter who killed Charlie Kirk last September, FBI Director Kash Patel spent six sentences praising Trump and the FBI before getting to the actual findings in the case. I remember watching it live, hearing “ This is what happens when you let good cops be cops.” OMG SHUT UP!
Trump’s hubris has literally started wars. We are at the mercy of an egomaniac, and the people he has carefully chosen to surround himself with are no better. They continue to pump him up, thus showing their complicity in our nation’s downfall.
When you acknowledge that he stocked his cabinet with yes-men and women, it makes sense that hardly anyone is qualified for their positions. Ego explains why Trump adores the uneducated. It explains why they diminish universities and the credentials of medical and scientific professionals to serve their agenda. Expertise in their minds is more about who has the biggest compliments for Trump, the biggest bank account, the most connections, and who can exert the most confidence in the face of genuine scrutiny. It’s certainly not who spent years learning about the actual subject matter for which they’re employed (what a concept).
Why would one want to intentionally surround themselves with those they have deemed “inferior,” if not only for ego? It’s the only explanation for such horrifically childish and narcissistic advice. I guess it would be appealing to someone who wants to manipulate others and assert their superiority and control over them.
Personally, I want to be around people who are smarter than me.
I want to be able to learn from people and be inspired by them. It doesn’t mean that I’m striving to be the least intelligent in the room; rather, it means that I’m not keeping score at all. I’m focusing on building off of other people’s strengths, offering my own to others, hoping that in the end we’re all better off for it. It’s eliminating competition from the equation, because many of us understand that everyone who is authentic has something to offer.
I’ve been in situations where I am the smartest, or at least the most prepared and perceptive person in the room, and it is actually so frustrating. To sit in a meeting with clients and coworkers and have your coworkers completely misinterpret the clients’ questions (because they’ve inserted their own assumptions instead of really listening), then go on long rants answering the question that has not been asked, only for the client to have to re-ask the question afterwards—when I knew what they were trying to say the entire time—is frustrating to say the least.
True intelligence means wanting to be around people from whom you can learn and grow. It means listening and not just waiting for your turn to speak. I never, ever want to be the smartest person in the room, partly because I do not want to ever be calculating intellectual superiority rankings for the sake of my own hubris.
We know that Trump thinks he is always the smartest person in the room, which is precisely what makes him a terrible leader, a weak, fragile baby, and a person who lashes out at entire countries or groups of marginalized people to make himself feel better.
Karoline’s advice may have sounded profound to her listeners in the moment. Be one step ahead of everyone around you, so you can be a winner. But to me, it just sounds like climbing to the highest rock in the park to shout you’re the king of the world; it feels good in the moment, but it doesn’t actually mean anything.
She’s not the most well-read in the room; she just acts like she is. She prepares for what others will say so she can counter it, for the surface-level perception that she has “won” the interaction. Her podium affords her the last word if she wants it, and boy does she want it. She probably thinks “bully pulpit” means she should bully others from her pulpit.
No.
Teddy Roosevelt coined that phrase to mean using the privilege of a platform to share ideas and inspire people. “Bully” was slang during his time, meaning “excellent” or “wonderful.” Not just the bullying we know today. I digress, but I have to brag about slogging through TR’s biography whenever I can, because it was a full-time job.
Karoline Leavitt being an actual bully may mean she is skilled in debate (which is debatable), but it doesn’t mean she actually follows her own advice to be well-read. She may know what people are criticizing the current admin for at any given time, because that’s her job, but we are not changing the definition of well-read to mean you’ve read the latest gossip. This lady is out here butchering half-decent advice to serve her agenda. Same with Trump and all his cronies who are cosplaying as important figures in our government while destroying it from the inside. They’re all just faking it and they are not making it, lemme tell ya.
All this to say, let’s actually be well-read, in its true meaning.
Let’s be knowledgeable and nuanced in our thinking, and not just live to be in competition with others. Let’s respect our peers and their ability to offer us new perspectives. Let’s be humble, and agree we each have a lot to learn from each other.
Let’s maybe not be… assholes… k?
xo, Amy