It’s time for us to check in again with All The Best People whom this administration* went out of its way to hire to maintain the institutions of the world’s oldest democracy. OK, this is the biggest fish in the smallest barrel, but it’s the first hot day of the year and I may faint from heatstroke, rather than from the continual shock of learning that this administration’s hiring practices are one baby-step above those employed by strip joints that pay people to hand out flyers in Times Square.

First, over at EPA, people are scooting back toward the private sector one step ahead of the congressional dunghammer. From The Washington Post (via The Chicago Tribune):

The two top officials in charge of security and toxic-waste cleanups at the Environmental Protection Agency have abruptly left their jobs, days after EPA administrator Scott Pruitt told lawmakers his subordinates were to blame for ethics problems that have imperiled his political future and prompted more than a dozen federal investigations.

No, thanks, Scott Pruitt. This foxhole is full.

Pruitt's spending on security and some of the security contracts with Perrotta are among the topics of the federal probes involving the EPA under Pruitt, a former Oklahoma attorney general. Pruitt, an ardent advocate of minimizing regulation, has survived the kind of scandals that have brought down several other Cabinet appointees of President Donald Trump's.

Because every damn Republican in the Congress agrees with him.

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Pruitt repeatedly deflected blame last week, describing subordinates as going too far in carrying out their duties, in excesses that occurred without his knowledge. In the case of the $43,000 booth, for example, Pruitt acknowledged to lawmakers he had asked for a private and secure phone line when he arrived at the agency, but he said staffers took it upon themselves to spend tens of thousands of dollars on it. It was security officials, not Pruitt, who decided he should fly first class, he said. Pruitt pledged last week to take care of the problems. "Ultimately, as the administrator of the EPA, the responsibility of identifying and making necessary changes rests with me and no one else," Pruitt told lawmakers then.

Wait for it.

Notably, most Republican lawmakers at the hearings declined to join the Democratic dogpile on Pruitt.

Notably?

Meanwhile, over at the Bureau of Indian Affairs, one of the most misbegotten agencies ever concocted, this administration* found a way to add another layer of sleaze to the BIA’s history. From The Hill:

The former director of the Interior Department’s Bureau of Indian Affairs resigned last week in the wake of a claim he behaved aggressively toward a female employee, Talking Points Memo reported Wednesday. Bryan Rice resigned from the post after just six months on the job. The department did not give a reason for his resignation at the time. Talking Points Memo obtained an email from an employee at the Bureau of Indian Affairs who alleges that Rice “repeatedly pointed his finger in my face in a harassing and bullying manner.” She called the behavior “pervasive.”

Staying on staff at Camp Runamuck, however, albeit now on administrative leave, is Ximena Barretto over at Health and Human Services. Ms. Barretto is a “political appointee,” which means that she got placed because of her political opinions, which are somewhat exotic, as a Media Matters collection pretty much demonstrates.

Barreto has repeatedly pushed the false Pizzagate conspiracy theory…

OK, that’s enough.

“All the best people” is never not going to be hilarious.

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Charles P. Pierce Charles P Pierce is the author of four books, most recently Idiot America, and has been a working journalist since 1976.

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