As for the pretrip and post trip inspections being stupid, they might be, but part of the reason for them is two fold, the first one for the DOT is revenue generation in the form of fines for both the company that owns the trucks and trailers and also the driver if they are not done, second is revenue when an inspection occurs and the brakes are found either out of adjustment or worse yet, too bad of shape the rig should have never been taken out on the road in the first place, as in cracked drums, missing pads completely, drums worn too thin, air chambers dangling by the air hoses or gone altogether and the lines capped, tires that are bald, cracked rims and a host of other issues that are routinely found at road side inspection, not to mention missing or undone paperwork.
The driver isn't actually required to be a brake expert or fix or even adjust anything per say, its a way to force the companies to either fix the stuff or hire someone willing to at least look at the truck and trailer before they hop and hit the key, also it opens up being able to double fine for the same offense, the driver and also the company, twice the revenue with the same effort is basically what it gets down to.
With the new points system the DOT has put out, for each inspection done the company gets points awarded to it, when they hit a certain score as in low enough of one, any time that companies trucks are seen on the road they get automatically pulled over and can no longer be charged with harassment or singling out any company, its based on safety violations, when their score and inspections are bad enough, their DOT number is revoked and their entire fleet can sit permanently.
Its already making a difference in my area, some of the worst companies are being forced to finally do something, one bought a whole new fleet of not exactly new, but newer road worthy trucks and trailers, another was shut down till its entire fleet of trucks and trailers could each individual truck and trailer passed inspection, which took months to achieve working on them 7 days a week while parked [do you think they had issues]? So maybe not perfect, its a start for some of worst companies out there.