Will you knock it off with this SES shilling? It's about as batshit crazy as that flat Earth crap.
There are a goodly number of political appointees with the SES –those guys are the problem, not the SES in general.
SES-1 through SES-5 are simply pay grades for the higher end of the civil service. They are positioned above the GS-series.
And there's an entire continent just for you. Move there.