Thursday, Lafayette, Indiana

The classic television show Get Smart (1965-1970) was a spoof of the James Bond spy films popular at the time. In addition, it was in the middle of the Cold War tensions with the Soviet Union. This was a frightening time of stress for every citizen. We lived with the daily fear of a nuclear world war. People built bomb shelters in their yards. Children participated in regular bomb drills hiding under school desks preparing for the ultimate possibility.

In the middle of this comes Maxwell Smart, our best undercover agent. Agent Smart was at the center of our nation’s spy activities. He was matched against our sworn enemy, known as KAOS, in a cat and mouse game of spy versus spy. The recurring plot of the show is how Max bumbles his way through and somehow prevails against KAOS. He does this through through sheer accident and fortuitous happenstance.

The theme of the show is that we survived the cold war unscathed not through brilliant competence, but through sheer idiot’s luck.

And this is a great fear of the citizenry: Instead of partisan conspiracy and ideological agendas, what if the real problem with government is that they are simply incompetent? What if, like Max, they are innocent, inept and simply lucky so far? Is this what’s keeping us safe?

Dear Heaven, we pray it is not the case!

Indicators that a government agent is not competent:

- Fails to block his caller I.D. when making dangerous contacts

- Drives a bright yellow car

- Runs for local political office

- Signs up for eHarmony.com

- Habitually loses his gun

- Speaks with an easily identifiable lisp

- Throws up at the sight of blood

- Constantly reverses letters of his code name

- Is terrified of flying

- Has severe arthritis in his fists

Reader Charles offered these additional signs:

- Forwards fellow agents email jokes without using the BCC option.

- Leaves hard drive with encryption keys for multi-billion dollar satellite communication system on top of car and drives off. Drive never found.
 
- Transposing a number in the street address of an informer and then asking for the informer’s address by name at…police headquarters.
 
- Leaves dashboard mounted GPS in car after days of field operations. GPS unit stolen and history downloaded, revealing all communications drops and routes for the last twelve weeks.
 
- Local help paid in untraceable US$100 bills. Result: a cup of tea in all surrounding villages now costs $100….
 
- Identical wrapping paper on similar size gift results in agent’s wife in Alexandria receiving gift intended for Polish agent. Polish agent not amused by contents, breaks off contact.