On the evening newscasts, the Salahis are being skewered by a Congressional committee. As is their right, the invoke the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution and its protection.
The Congressmen are adept at making these folks look foolish and, perhaps, criminal. After all, they are lawyers for the most part and they know the response they are getting is the only intelligent one. Congressmen and women are drooling for camera time. That is all this is about.
These folks may or may not have thought they were invited to the People's House. Either way, they apparently threatened no one, nor did they hurt anyone. The worst thing they may have done was eat some of Colin Powell's caviar, or rather government caviar intended for Colin.
Some self-absorbed appointee most likely offered them a left handed verbal invitation. Regardless, they did not represent themselves as anyone but who they really are. They are guilty of incredible arrogance and self-aggrandizement at worst. A Secret Service guard failed in his duty, it appears. That should be addressed.
I never met these people and do not want to meet them. I just don't think they are criminals with relation to the White House dinner.
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Tuesday, January 05, 2010
How Government Works - An Oxymoron
In school, we were told that our government has three branches. Some of us remember that. Most do not. Coincidentally, government has three levels of functionality, or rather, dysfunctionality.
The lowest level consists of the folks who keep things going. They patrol borders, account for mineral royalties owed to the Federal government, chase bank robbers, maintain aircraft, and collect taxes. They work hard for low pay. Witness the fact that many former Feds are the best defense attorneys and tax consultants. They do a lot better in the private sector.
The middle level starts at some level of management up to the highest level career employees, short of political appointees. These folks may or may not know anything about the mission of their agency. That is immaterial. Their interests lie in building turf and protecting same, covering their butts, and kissing the bottoms of peers and higher-ups in the interest of said turf protection and the acquisition of power. Power is what they live for. It is everything to them. And, because they have such a mean existence, they exercise that power in ways that are disgusting to normal human beings. If all you have is a twisted pomposity, you relish the opportunity to hurt others for no reason.
One such megalomaniac was responsible for staffing a large number of government offices in the midwest. Other bureaucrats more in line with the first group of government had recruited and trained good people who must then be turned over to the imperious little fiend. It happened that one newbie lived in Town A while another lived in Town B about two hundred miles away. Both recruits did well in training and showed equal promise. There were identical vacancies in both Towns A and B. The big shot saw an opportunity to inflict his will in a painful way and was never one to miss an opportunity. Gloating amid his subordinate staff, he purposefully assigned the resident of Town A to the vacancy in Town B and vice versa. He made no secret of his motive, for what good is your paltry little authority if you can't brag about misusing it within your fiefdom?
Of course, the result was that the recruits balked at the assignments and resigned. This meant the petty tyrant had wasted a lot of government money in such a way that would never be traced to his actions. The agency had to recruit and train two more employees. It is interesting to note this little man died within six months of retirement. Without some subordinates to mistreat, he wasted away quickly.
Another thing these mid level miscreants spend time on is bedding subordinates in return for favors and/or veiled promises. If the subordinate is able to get the jerk to come through with the promotion promised, the subordinate often becomes a willing vassal helping to enlarge and protect the fiefdom. The subordinate may sometimes be awarded a fiefdom all their own. In Texas, the leadership of one government agency can be traced through such relationships back several generations. A woman widowed early by WWII took a lover or two. Some of the fellows may have been congressmen, it is rumored. She gained her sizable holdings in this manner. She passed the empire on to the next generation in a similar way. It has been going on for sixty years now to successive despots of both sexes.
That is pretty typical stuff in government.
We must not forget the third and final level. These are the political appointees. They know nothing about the mission of the agency. Their specialty is delivering money and votes to the candidate. Other than that, they are clueless! They are the antithesis of vampires, coming to life only when camera strobes throw light upon their pale faces. Appointees live for photo ops. Political appointees never lie in the strictest sense because they think that, if they said something, it must be true. It is not that they disregard facts so much as they are unable to identify them. The world in which they live is perfect and they recognize nothing to the contrary. A perfect example is Napolitano's assertion that the system worked, despite the fact that a Nigerian terrorist failed to destroy an air liner in mid-air only because of his incompetence in mixing chemical cocktails. She really believed her statement to be true because she has absolutely no link to reality.
The politico must have well appointed corner offices, a limo at least as nice as the last appointee had, and someone to carry luggage on junkets. The jerks in the middle level see to all of this as part of turf protection and enhancement. It is also the responsibility of the middle to maintain the fairy world in which all political appointees and elected officials reside. The middle filters all information, being sure to remove any unsavory truth and replace it with the things the appointee wants, nay, needs to hear.
Appointees have names like Dorcas and Rahm, which precludes them from ever getting elected to positions of significance in their own right. They bask in the reflected glory of others. After all, they paid for it.
The lowest level consists of the folks who keep things going. They patrol borders, account for mineral royalties owed to the Federal government, chase bank robbers, maintain aircraft, and collect taxes. They work hard for low pay. Witness the fact that many former Feds are the best defense attorneys and tax consultants. They do a lot better in the private sector.
The middle level starts at some level of management up to the highest level career employees, short of political appointees. These folks may or may not know anything about the mission of their agency. That is immaterial. Their interests lie in building turf and protecting same, covering their butts, and kissing the bottoms of peers and higher-ups in the interest of said turf protection and the acquisition of power. Power is what they live for. It is everything to them. And, because they have such a mean existence, they exercise that power in ways that are disgusting to normal human beings. If all you have is a twisted pomposity, you relish the opportunity to hurt others for no reason.
One such megalomaniac was responsible for staffing a large number of government offices in the midwest. Other bureaucrats more in line with the first group of government had recruited and trained good people who must then be turned over to the imperious little fiend. It happened that one newbie lived in Town A while another lived in Town B about two hundred miles away. Both recruits did well in training and showed equal promise. There were identical vacancies in both Towns A and B. The big shot saw an opportunity to inflict his will in a painful way and was never one to miss an opportunity. Gloating amid his subordinate staff, he purposefully assigned the resident of Town A to the vacancy in Town B and vice versa. He made no secret of his motive, for what good is your paltry little authority if you can't brag about misusing it within your fiefdom?
Of course, the result was that the recruits balked at the assignments and resigned. This meant the petty tyrant had wasted a lot of government money in such a way that would never be traced to his actions. The agency had to recruit and train two more employees. It is interesting to note this little man died within six months of retirement. Without some subordinates to mistreat, he wasted away quickly.
Another thing these mid level miscreants spend time on is bedding subordinates in return for favors and/or veiled promises. If the subordinate is able to get the jerk to come through with the promotion promised, the subordinate often becomes a willing vassal helping to enlarge and protect the fiefdom. The subordinate may sometimes be awarded a fiefdom all their own. In Texas, the leadership of one government agency can be traced through such relationships back several generations. A woman widowed early by WWII took a lover or two. Some of the fellows may have been congressmen, it is rumored. She gained her sizable holdings in this manner. She passed the empire on to the next generation in a similar way. It has been going on for sixty years now to successive despots of both sexes.
That is pretty typical stuff in government.
We must not forget the third and final level. These are the political appointees. They know nothing about the mission of the agency. Their specialty is delivering money and votes to the candidate. Other than that, they are clueless! They are the antithesis of vampires, coming to life only when camera strobes throw light upon their pale faces. Appointees live for photo ops. Political appointees never lie in the strictest sense because they think that, if they said something, it must be true. It is not that they disregard facts so much as they are unable to identify them. The world in which they live is perfect and they recognize nothing to the contrary. A perfect example is Napolitano's assertion that the system worked, despite the fact that a Nigerian terrorist failed to destroy an air liner in mid-air only because of his incompetence in mixing chemical cocktails. She really believed her statement to be true because she has absolutely no link to reality.
The politico must have well appointed corner offices, a limo at least as nice as the last appointee had, and someone to carry luggage on junkets. The jerks in the middle level see to all of this as part of turf protection and enhancement. It is also the responsibility of the middle to maintain the fairy world in which all political appointees and elected officials reside. The middle filters all information, being sure to remove any unsavory truth and replace it with the things the appointee wants, nay, needs to hear.
Appointees have names like Dorcas and Rahm, which precludes them from ever getting elected to positions of significance in their own right. They bask in the reflected glory of others. After all, they paid for it.
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