Tucker Carlson: America has once again become segregated

Tucker Carlson recounts how Colin Powell thrived in an American meritocracy that has been undone and replaced by division sewn by political leaders

Toward the end of his life, Powell sometimes said that his remarkable career was proof that affirmative action worked, but it always seemed like a halfhearted talking point. Anyone who knew Powell personally can confirm that he was as impressive as any person in the U.S. government and far more than most of them. He was legitimately smart, deeply knowledgeable about the world. He was openly patriotic. He was hardly a diversity hire. He was so obviously superior to a lot of the people around him. When the supposedly brilliant Harvard-educated neocons in the Bush administration assured us that the occupation of Iraq would be quick and simple. Colin Powell knew better. He may have gone to lowly City College, but he was smarter and wiser than they were. Unlike other people in Washington, Colin Powell got where he was on merit, and that was inspiring to watch. Powell’s success meant that our system worked. Our system was meritocratic at the time. It elevated the best. Thirty years ago, our meritocracy was the country's unifying principle. All Americans were proud of it. Colin Powell embodied it. 

A lot has changed in the years since, and that's one of the reasons that Colin Powell’s death tonight is so poignant. Like almost everyone his age, Colin Powell was fully vaccinated against COVID, and yet, according to his family and doctors, Colin Powell died of COVID. Of course, that fact does not make his death any less sad. Nor is it unusual. Many thousands of vaccinated Americans have died of COVID. Former CDC Director Robert Redfield announced just today that about 40 percent of all recent COVID deaths in the state of Maryland, for example, are among those who have had both shots.