Somebody should tell Mullin’s critics that academic credentials ain’t what they used to be.
It was William F. Buckley who said, “I would rather be governed by the first 2,000 people in the Boston telephone directory than by the Harvard University faculty.” That was in the late 1950s. Some of us haven’t learned a thing since then.
When Senator Markwayne Mullin (R-OK) was tapped to replace Kristi Noem as Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), some in the media and political establishment questioned his qualifications because he only holds an associate degree.
Left-wing journalist Kyle Griffin stated on X that, “Markwayne Mullin looks to be the only currently serving senator without at least a bachelor’s degree.” The horror!
Mullin was attending Mission Valley College when his father became ill. At 20, he left school to run the family plumbing business. He eventually got an associate degree in construction technology in 2010. In the meantime, the plumbing business thrived and Mullin started several other businesses. He also hosted a home improvement radio show and fought in mixed martial arts competitions. He’s created millions of dollars in wealth. He’s what was once called a “self- made man.”
But without an undergraduate degree (and its accompanying debt, without corresponding certainty of a career in a chosen field), Mullin is somehow unqualified to run DHS in the eyes of many on the progressive left. Part of this is rank political partisanship. Mullin’s supposed lack of academic achievement is the weapon to hand. Many of the same people questioning his qualifications swore that George W. Bush was an idiot, despite degrees from Yale and Harvard Business.
There’s a simple snobbery to the issue as well. Sophisticates who’ve swum in the waters of metropolitan elite academia (ie, been indoctrinated) hold all the “correct” opinions about climate change, gender, open borders, and foreign policy focused on global priorities. In the elitists’ minds, things like law and order, border security, the economy, taxes, and moral issues are the preoccupations of the less well educated.
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It’s also credentialism – a mindset that overvalues pieces of paper and letters trailing after a person’s name. Credentialism pays lip service to the American meritocracy (we speak in terms of “earning” a degree), but it gives short shrift to manifestations of it other than those on paper. Credentialism is rife in educated society, and particularly among college-educated left-wingers. It ignores the problem of grade inflation and undemanding coursework at many schools, or the usefulness – or lack thereof – of many degrees. College ceased to be a sure thing, and a resume enhancer, a long time ago.
Mullin has made payroll, managed capital, managed people, satisfied customers (there’s no grade inflation in a small business) and met state and local regulations. And it was all for real stakes.
He’s done everything managers do. That doesn’t mean he will necessarily be a successful DHS Secretary, but it certainly doesn’t hurt.
On the other hand, a former DHS Secretary with strong academic credentials failed miserably in the job. Biden DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas holds an undergraduate degree from the University of California at Berkeley and a J.D. from Loyola Marymount. (Mayorkas has never worked in the private sector.) On his watch, millions of unvetted illegal aliens surged into the United States. Crime skyrocketed. He destroyed the secure border created by President Trump. The public backlash to the flood of illegal aliens was one of the issues that cost his party the presidency in 2024.
Unfortunately, many politicians of both parties have never worked in the private sphere, just as too few have been in the military. Yet they make decisions that affect the lives of businesspeople and service members all the time.
But there’s no shortage of paper credentials in Washington. We’ve had the Harvard faculty. Maybe we should try the phonebook.
James Fitzpatrick is a U.S. Army veteran, a former appointee in the Trump 45 administration, and Director of the Center to Advance Security in America.
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