Smug experts shattered our trust — now ‘charlatans and cranks’ fill the void

David Gergen : Populist right seems to have learned many of the wrong lessons from the COVID-era cratering of trust in experts and authority.

He says populists are filling the credibility void with charlatans and cranks who do little more than assuage their confirmation bias.

Expertise is real, but it is not holy writ, Gergen says, and we should stop expecting people with specialized knowledge to be imbued with seer-like abilities.

In the adult world, it’s a ridiculous trope. There are many good questions to ask. Challenging every historical event and piece of scientific wisdom, though, is the domain of an ignoramus. Knowledge matters. Any idiot can “ask questions.” David Harsanyi is a senior writer at the Washington Examiner . Twitter @davidharsanyi .