Government has made America inept.

[August]

This is a very interesting and I feel illuminating article from The Daily Beast.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/article...ica-inept.html

While government is often portrayed as some evil entity bent upon domination it's travesties and it's failures are nearly always the result of blind obedience and enforcement of regulations. "Mindless bureaucracy" .

At this point, American democracy is basically run by dead people—by past generations of legislators and regulators who wrote the laws and regulations that dictate today’s public policy, allocate most of annual budgets, and micromanage public choices. It’s not surprising that Washington works so badly. Imagine if you had to run a business by following every idea that any former manager ever had.

[Skybird]

“You may be expelled for homicide.”



We will most probably not bang our heads at least over this thread, August. With only some minor rewriting, the article could be used to describe realities over here as well.

These symptoms will become much worse, and at increasing pace. That is the nature of bureaucratic systems: they must expand, else they collapse - and with them those precious power structures.

[Sailor Steve]

Great article! Now I need to read all three of his books.

[TarJak]

I believe that it's much the same wherever you find bureaucracy. Yes Minister and Yes Prime Minister are great satires of the effect of years of behaviour driven by the decisions of the past.

[August]

To those who believe there is some shadowy group of elites secretly pulling strings behind the scenes:

There’s a tendency to attribute ulterior purpose to the failures of government. Sleazy deals are certainly easy to find. But pay a visit to the innards of the giant machine, and mainly what you find is not calculating people trying to get something for someone, but a comedy of rules without reason

[Oberon]

[u crank]

Law has crowded out the ability to be practical or fair. Mindless rigidity has descended upon the land, from the school house to the White House to, sometimes, your house. Nothing much works, because no one is free to make things work.

I have seen an increasing tendency for this kind of thing my whole life. It's maddening, like pushing water uphill. It is not just an American problem. I wonder, have we painted ourselves into a corner?

[Wolferz]

Originally Posted by u crank

I have seen an increasing tendency for this kind of thing my whole life. It's maddening, like pushing water uphill. It is not just an American problem. I wonder, have we painted ourselves into a corner?

The rank and file aren't holding the paint brush. But we keep voting more lawyers into office to continue the same old ignorance and apathy.

I have to say that it isn't government making America inept,it's government making the government inept.

[Sailor Steve]

Originally Posted by Oberon

...

[Rhodes]

Covering up aliens conspiracies are easy. Ruling on the other hand...

[Jimbuna]

Originally Posted by Oberon

Post of the month thus far

[Betonov]

That's because you don't have the most democratic government in the world
We have elections EVERY year now

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by August

To those who believe there is some shadowy group of elites secretly pulling strings behind the scenes:

Yes, that quote is right also, it aims at what I try to summarise as the "self-dynamic of the system".

But abuse by intended decisions also are a reality, at the top levels of hierarchies. That can be the top of the complete system-pyramid, or the top level within one sub-levelled branch of the hierarchy.

[August]

Originally Posted by Skybird

Yes, that quote is right also, it aims at what I try to summarise as the "self-dynamic of the system".

But abuse by intended decisions also are a reality, at the top levels of hierarchies. That can be the top of the complete system-pyramid, or the top level within one sub-levelled branch of the hierarchy.

Of course. Leaders are human too and affected by all the normal human vices and faults just like anyone else. But depending on the government type their ability to get away with it for long is fairly limited.

"You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time." - A. Lincoln

The key is transparency. The same cure for bureaucracy maybe.

[Wolferz]

Our government is always fighting some kind of war or wars. They currently include...
The war on poverty.
The war on drugs.
The war on terrorism.
The war on crime.
The war on obesity.
Et cetera ad nauseum.

Now if the government could only start fighting the right war/s...
The war on government waste.
The war on government red tape.
The war on government stupidity.
The war on the military industrial complex.
The war on selfish lobbyists.
The war on government snooping.
The war on war.

It's all absurd to the extreme and makes me want to go to DC and stand across from the capitol building and stare in an unapproving fashion.