We almost let out a sigh of relief when Washoe County Manager Eric Brown packed up and rode off into retirement. Not because we're ungrateful (well, maybe a little), but because we thought one particular pet project might quietly fade into the bureaucratic sunset: the Washoe Leadership Academy.

You remember it — the program dusted off and rebranded under Brown’s watch, pumped full of self-congratulatory rhetoric and framed as the next great investment in “leadership.” A noble idea on its surface, sure. But let’s not kid ourselves — this thing wasn’t designed to nurture leaders so much as to cultivate admirers, and it would seem you need to be a graduate of the academy in order to be appointed to a county board of commission. Brain-washing anyone?