In 1998, Margaret Atwood — renowned author of “The Handmaid’s Tale” and a multitude of other literary gems — wrote a psychological thriller titled “Surfacing,” in which she offered this concise observation on some of mankind’s shortcomings:

“Stupidity is the same as evil if you judge by the results.“
– Margaret Atwood, “Surfacing”

And that sentence immediately brought to mind an article in yesterday’s news about the latest diplomatic action taken by Marco Rubio, who currently wears three hats as Secretary of State, acting National Security Adviser, and acting Archivist for the U.S. government. He is, to say the least, a busy man.

But somehow he manages to find time to attend to those little details that, if overlooked, would be certain to create havoc sufficient to cause the collapse of the entire nation. Today’s case in point: the standard font for all official Department of State documents.

You see, this vital issue — which has taken precedence over finding a solution to the war in Ukraine, maintaining the tenuous Gaza peace, analyzing Russia’s threats against Europe, and countering China’s AI dominance — obviously has the power to destroy us all because it involves the issue of DEIA, which is DEI with the addition of Accessibility.

It seems that Times New Roman has been the choice of fonts for the U.S. government since 2004, which was perfectly adequate when official documents were memorialized on something called paper. But at some point during the Biden administration, a sharp-eyed individual recognized that Times New Roman was not as easily readable on computer screens. So a new, digital-friendly font called Calibri was devised, eliminating the unnecessary finishing strokes on the Times New Roman letters and making it more accessible to people with disabilities such as impaired vision, dyslexia, or perhaps those on the autism spectrum.

Thus — in the minds of the anti-woke, anti-DEIA, anti-milk-of-human-kindness members of the Trump administration — this became an Accessibility issue. And heaven forbid, we should ever do anything to make life a little easier for people whose disabilities already weigh on them. Because helping people would be the next thing to socialism, which is just a short step away from communism. Or some such crap.

And besides, the change to Calibri was a Biden administration action, which automatically classifies it as despicable, illegal, and quite possibly seditious . . . and which may provide an excuse for Pam Bondi to start a whole new investigation.

So, in order to keep the government from experiencing a total meltdown, the very busy Marco Rubio has directed U.S. diplomats around the world to switch from the offending Calibri back to Times New Roman 14-point font in all official documents, with the State Department issuing the following explanatory statement:

“Whether for internal memoranda, papers prepared for principals, or documents shared externally, consistent formatting strengthens credibility and supports a unified Department identity.” [Rachel Treisman, NPR, December 11, 2025.]

Your tax dollars at work!

I wonder whether Margaret Atwood has ever contemplated the effects of a combination of stupidity and evil. If not, she has plenty of material now.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
12/12/25