I think Patrick Nielsen Hayden is being unfair to Assistant Secretary of Defense Charles Abell.
After all, is there any actual evidence that he worked any less hard, or learned any less, in achieving his master’s degree from “diploma mill” Columbus University than George W. Bush did in earning his B.A. from Yale?
Anyway, Abell is only the #2 in the Pentagon’s personnel and readiness operation. That sounds like a harmless enough spot to park someone with fake credentials, since the Defense Department isn’t facing any particular personnel or readiness issues right now, as far as I know. It’s not as if there were a war on, or anything.