We hear endlessly about the Deep State—a hidden cabal, working in the shadows, pulling strings behind closed doors. It’s a comforting myth, really. It suggests that the real problems are buried far below the surface, complex and secretive, beyond the reach of ordinary citizens.
The truth is far less dramatic and far more embarrassing.
What we actually have is the Shallow State.
Nothing here is hidden. Nothing is particularly sophisticated. The dysfunction is right out in the open, floating just beneath the surface of daily life like debris you’re forced to step around. This is a government obsessed with optics over outcomes, narratives over results, and performance over competence.
In the Shallow State, appearances are policy. Social media posts substitute for leadership. Press conferences replace problem-solving. Everyone is “fighting for the American people” while actively making life harder for them. Shutdowns occur not because solutions are impossible, but because spectacle is useful.
This is not a government captured by shadowy masterminds—it’s one run by people deeply invested in being seen doing something while ensuring nothing actually gets done. The incentives are obvious and public: outrage drives donations, paralysis avoids accountability, and stalemate guarantees job security. Failure, remarkably, carries no consequences.
Federal workers miss paychecks. Travelers miss flights. Families wait in lines for assistance. And yet the system rolls on exactly as designed, rewarding those at the top while externalizing the cost to everyone else. No conspiracy required. No secrecy necessary. Just indifference, ego, and a fixation on surface-level wins.
Libertarians are often accused of paranoia for distrusting government power. But this doesn’t require paranoia—only eyesight. The Shallow State isn’t plotting in the dark; it’s live-streaming its incompetence.
What’s most dangerous about the Shallow State is not malice but emptiness. Institutions hollowed out by performative politics lose legitimacy, not because they are secretly evil, but because they are visibly unserious. When governance becomes branding, the public becomes collateral damage.
The real conspiracy, if one insists on calling it that, is the quiet agreement across parties that this is acceptable. That gridlock is normal. That suffering is a tactic. That accountability is optional.
Nothing is hidden. Everything is exposed. And that may be the most damning truth of all.
The problem isn’t how deep the rot goes.
It’s how shallow it’s become.
