No One Is Competent

Holiday special folks.  We're doin all the U.S. presidents, every single one. Sit back, relax and take a drink every time we say "this could be an entire episode", Azalea interrupts Jae or we make a pointless reference you don't understand.

EVE Online is a space-based MMORPG that since 2003 has been host to a dynamic, ever-evolving user-driven world replete with stories of warfare, conquest, and betrayal. In many ways the history of EVE's universe mirrors that of our own, and in any case this is a history worth retelling. On this somewhat unusual episode of "No One is Competent" we'll be diving into the strange and entertaining world...

Of all the conflicts throughout the Revolutionary and Napoleonic era, perhaps none is more... odd than that of the Second Coalition. From heavily armed academic expeditions to dramatic marches through the Alps, this conflict - and the invasion of Egypt that led into it - had just about everything. On this episode of "No One is Competent" we'll be covering the entirety of the War of the Second Coal...

The word "baseball" is one that conjures up an array of different images and thoughts. For many the sport that is acclaimed as the "America's national pastime" is associated with tradition and legacy. Plenty of modern fans however think of the game as a game defined by statistics and models. One thing that is common in both views the baseball, however, is cheating. From corking to doping, cheating...

The relationship between Napoleon Bonaparte and the French Revolution has long been a point of discussion amongst those interested in the history of the Revolution. For the early Marxists Napoleon's rise to power served as a cautionary tale as to how a popular military leader could subvert the revolution, yet in Napoleon's own mind he was the revolution. What is certain is that Napoleon was a prod...

Governors are an often overlooked part of the American political landscape. One can make a fair argument that the lives of most Americans are more directly influenced by the actions of their governor than those of their president, yet many would struggle to describe their state governor beyond simply naming what party they belong to. On this episode we're taking a look at tenure of Georgia Governo...

The War of the First Coalition was fought over a course of 5 years and involved almost all of Europe's great powers. The events of this conflict shaped the course of the French Revolution and set the stage for the future Revolutionary and Napoleonic conflicts. Yet few today know much of this war, allowing for misconceptions to make their way into the popular understanding of it. On this episode of...

Few events in western history are as well-studied yet commonly misunderstood as the French Revolution. In this episode we hope to clear things up and lay the groundwork for future episodes by covering both the political developments within France from 1789 to 1794 and the military campaigns of the War of the First Coalition from 1792 to 1794. 

The French Revolution is arguably the most studied event in western historiography alongside the World Wars. Perhaps no other upheaval has had so much of an influence on the way we think about politics and society. Yet the Revolution was not a predestined affair, instead it was the result of both the structural problems of the Ancien Regime and the decisions of the Bourbon monarchs who failed to a...

The story of military history is full of brilliant technological innovations. From the recurve bow to the main battle tank, humans have continued to come up with increasingly efficient ways of killing one another. Yet for every great invention there are dozens of duds - technological dead ends, creations ahead of their time, and all-round bad ideas. Today we're looking at one of those more ignomin...

The defeat of the Spanish Armada in 1588 remains one of the most famous events in naval history, yet the fate of England's equally disastrous attempt at seeking revenge on Spain the year afterwards has largely faded from popular memory. In this episode of "No One is Competent" we'll be covering we are covering the English Armada, one of the greatest defeats in the history of England's navy.

While history is full of famous battles and campaigns, only a few naval actions have managed to remain widely known long after they took place. The Spanish Armada of 1588 ranks near the top of that select group of events. In England it's cast as a critical moment in the development of the Royal Navy, the institution that more than any other would be responsible for asserting the might of the Briti...

Prohibition is perhaps one of the strangest and most misunderstood episodes in American history. The entire nation turned their back on their most beloved vice - or at least, that's what was supposed to happen. Instead, the 18th Amendment, brought about by intentions both good and bad, led to 13 years of organized crime and lawbreaking on vast scale and an increase in police authority that remains...

Rome at the dawn of the first century AD was an empire on the rise. As the civil wars of the late Republican period faded into the past, the new government of Augustus Caesar looked set to assert its will on an ever-growing amount of territory and peoples. Yet in 9 AD the Roman Army suffered a defeat so total that it permanently altered the fate of Roman expansion on an entire frontier. On this ep...

According to many of Silicon Valley's brightest minds the "cloud" is the future of just about everything. So why not let consumers use it to play console video games, freeing them of the need to actually buy those bulky devices themselves? That certainly was a part of the thought process behind Google's Stadia service... but as it turns out, it seems as if the market quite wasn't on the same page...

People around the world are used to expecting a certain level of corruption from their leaders. Greed and self-interest are a part of the universal human experience. What most people aren't used to, however, is the idea that the leader of their country may be subservient to a shadowy religious figure that has been manipulating their life for over three decades. Join us for this episode of "No One...

America's presidential elections are notoriously byzantine in their complexity, with thousands of counties all counting votes to report to states that then select electors that themselves vote for the president in a process dating back to the late 18th century. In spite of all of this complexity, for the most part elections end up, well, working. Every now and then, though, the system throws up a...

We tend to think of big wars as turning points in the history of nations. Battles and campaigns are picked apart at length, and how and why one side wins or loses is subject of much discussion. What comes after these wars, however, is often overlooked. The Civil War is a famous turning point in American history, as its outcome determined whether the nation would exist as a whole or remain split in...

Of all the ills to spring up in the aftermath of the first world war, perhaps none were as ruinous as the ideology known as fascism. As political extremism spread throughout Europe like a plague, fascist parties, often with the cooperation of traditional conservative and business interests, threatened numerous governments and in some cases successfully gained power for themselves. Yet across the A...

For over half a century Boeing dominated the commercial aviation industry. Boeing's jet airplanes have carried billions of people in almost every country, and in the process the company built a reputation for safety and solid engineering. It was thus a shock to the world when not one but two of Boeing's latest airliner crashed in a matter of months in late 2018 and early 2019. A look at the decisi...

The year is 1204 AD. Over 800 years after its consecration, the great city of Constantinople, the wealthiest and largest metropolis in all of Europe, lies in ruins. Flames burn through its streets as men in armour pick through its palaces, churches, and even tombs searching for plunder. Constantinople was medieval Europe's greatest connection to its ancient past, a city where much of the knowledge...

Trust the plan. The great awakening. Where we go one, we go all. All of these slogans and more came to represent one of the most conspiratorial and insidious political movements in American political history: QAnon. In the first "No One is Competent" episode on Q, we discussed the conditions that lead to the creation of this movement. In this second part, we'll go over the history and evolution of...

The US Capitol Building. 175,170 square feet that house the seat of legislative branch of the most powerful nation on Earth. For over two centuries the Capitol has stood as a symbol of American law and governance. For it to be breached and desecrated in a time of peace is almost unimaginable, yet on January 6th, 2021, that is exactly what happened. Join us on this special bonus episode of "No One...

Q. A single letter that represents an entire movement, one that unites both the fringes of the far-right militia movement and the most conspiratorial sections of the internet with mainstream conservative sentiment. We could spend ages talking about the many outlandish and ultimately incorrect predictions credited to the supposed "QAnon," but it's worth looking at just where this movement came from...

"Stalingrad." The mere name of the place evokes imagery of violence, death, and grim desperation. From August 1942 through February 1943 over a million soldiers and civilians would be killed, wounded, or captured in one of the largest battles in human history. At the end of the day, however, the Soviet Union stood triumphant, having inflicted upon Nazi Germany their greatest defeat at that point i...