Axar.az presents the article "Let us now Praise doctorates" by John Samuel Tieman.

In the 1950s and 60s, we were not intimidated by expertise. We admired it. We understood that the astronauts were in space because of engineers like Wernher von Braun. When the Apollo missions took folks to the moon, we knew that the nation was sending some of its finest scientists. One of the last men to walk on the moon, Apollo astronaut Harrison Schmidt, was awarded his Ph. D. in geology from Harvard. We admired Carl Sagan and Albert Einstein. Indeed, we did not simply admire their expertise. We aspired to it.

And today? A suburban Cincinnati woman, whose husband had COVID-19, won a court order forcing the hospital to treat her husband's virus with an anti-parasitic treatment commonly used for livestock. We really need to pause for that. The wife of a patient forced the hospital to prescribe a horse pill. A judge actually went along with this. Experts have been absolutely clear that, in order to combat COVID-19, we need to socially distance, wear a mask, and get vaccinated. Instead, many Americans take a horse pill. What changed?

While the divisions are not tidy, we can discern two elites, the power elite and the expertise elite. When I speak of the power elite, I mean folks who have gotten, through a variety of means, power enough to make public policy. Membership in the expertise elite is, generally though not exclusively, a matter of education. The master's degree and the doctorate often, though not always, are the entrance requirements.

A functioning elite empowers the community. When Drs. Jonas Salk and Albert Sabin produced the first polio vaccines, lives were saved. When President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the G. I. Bill in 1944, millions of veterans benefited from educational opportunities and assistance with housing. People are not empowered, or made free, by medical advice to take horse pills, or by a QAnon conspiracy theory that passes for news. Sadly, much of this is enabled by elected officials who should know better. Rep. Jim Jordan, a Republican from Ohio, who actually sits on the Select Subcommittee On The Coronavirus Crisis, has not been vaccinated. He insists it is a question of liberty. It is worth repeating that no one is empowered when folks, who should know better, enable the ignorance of others.

Last Saturday, I talked with my barber. His brother died in August. The brother won the Bronze Star for valour in Vietnam. For all his bravery, he wouldn't get vaccinated. The brother wouldn't listen to his physician or “the mainstream media.” It was, to him, a question of liberty. Sadly, and predictably, he died of COVID. Anti-vaxxers isolate themselves in what columnist Michelle Goldberg calls their “petulant solipsism”. They pray to be free. Their prayers are answered. They are free to get dreadfully ill and die. Truman Capote once said, “More tears are shed over answered prayers than unanswered ones.”

To be clear, I am not saying that all elites are correct about all matters. Roger Bacon and Isaac Newton practised alchemy. I am saying that we are a nation that used to take pride in the work of Linus Pauling and James Watson, pride in being informed by Walter Cronkite and Edward R. Murrow. Tonight, while some scoff at an expert on infectious diseases, Dr Anthony Fauchi, 2.9 million viewers will watch Tucker Carlson. A study found that folks, who exclusively watched FOX News, were far less knowledgeable than those who watched no news at all.

Many turn the word “elite” into a pejorative. They use it to express dissatisfaction with expertise and achievement. This isn't as insulting as it is terrifying. A nation without elites is a nation consigned to mediocrity.