He definitely was not involved in the low level grifts but the fish rots from the head

Corruption spreads down, just look at the "mighty" Russian military.

If an org is corrupt (example: Trump admin), the competent, honest, people would stay away, and you just attract idiots, whose motivations might be different to doing the best job possible.

I saw a gap to make that point and shot it. There is definitely formidable institutional inertia blocking meaningful change. I’m hoping history does rhyme and we’ll see an adoption of civil service reform policies by both parties like in the late 1800s