At least that’s what it looks like, seven years into the Obama administration, when Team Obama’s foreign policy aces at State, ahead of a key summit between Secretary of State John Kerry and Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov, hung the Russian flag upside down.

It wasn’t until a news cameraman in the press pool warned a top State Department official about the gaffe that anything was done.

“You’re not bullsh***ting me, right?” Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs Glenn Johnson asked the newsie.

“I’m not bullsh**ting you,” the cameraman confirmed.

“So the white should be on top?,” Johnson asked, according to a report from Russia’s RT News.

They’re a real bright bunch, totally on top of it as far as the Russians, a top strategic priority, are concerned.

It goes to show that not much has changed since the early days of the Obama administration, back when in 2009 then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton presented the same Lavrov with a “Reset” button that used a Russian word meaning “overcharge.” Apparently, no one in charge knows anything about the Russian language beyond Google Translate.

One can only imagine what Lavrov’s thoughts were as the mistakes were repeated at the end of Obama’s term.

But more to the point, with talent like this, is it any wonder the U.S. is continuously surprised by Russia whenever it takes out a neighbor, challenges our Navy off the U.S. coast, signs deals with the likes of Cuba’s dictator, wipes out terrorist lairs in Syria, or sends out a hit squad against an enemy abroad?

It’s not an insignificant place, despite Team Obama’s apparent belief that it’s just a nation in decline.

That’s the general consensus in Washington and why so few Russia experts are being churned out these days to populate the ranks of State — it’s actually a crisis, according to the Washington Post.

And that raises questions as to why there are so few people who know even what the Russian flag looks like among the Democrat-led establishment. Could it be that the biggest historic event around Russia — the failure of its communism — is why Democrats have so little interest in learning even the smallest details about Russia?

It’s as good a theory as any among the dumb-and-dumbers running Obama’s Russia shop.