That's why I became a consultant...
Office politics. That's why I left permanent jobs forever. Nothing can be done. Don't even kid yourselves. As the article states, good bosses are extremely hard to find. When you do, you are just lucky... If you don't, then as far as the incompetent boss is concerned, the person complaining is usually the one that gets in trouble, not the quite poor performer.
And, even as a consultant, poor performers at the client site are a massive problem. Why? They don't want you to outshine them. And it's worse if the incompetent management has the poor performer interviewing consultants, guess who they pick... the bright person who can solve the problem this slacker couldn't figure out; or a consultant who is clueless? Yep, the clueless one got it... In such cases, getting a consulting gig is hard - not only do you need to say you can solve the problem but also not look too smart as to leave the employees in the dust. What a pain!
