Once upon a time the government had a vast scrap yard in the middle of a desert. Congress said, "Someone may steal from it at night." So they created a night watchman position and hired a person for the job.
Then Congress said, "How does the watchman do his job without instruction?" So they created a planning department and hired two people, one person to write the instructions and one person to do time studies.
Then Congress said, "How will we know the night watchman is doing the tasks correctly?" So they created a Quality Control department and hired two people, one to do the studies and one to write the reports.
Then Congress said, "How are these people going to get paid?" So they created two positions, a time keeper and a payroll officer, then hired two people.
Then Congress said, "Who will be accountable for all of these people?"
So they created an administrative section and hired three people, an Administrative Officer, an Assistant Administrative Officer, and a Legal Secretary.
Then Congress said, "We have had this command in operation for one year, and we are $918,000 over budget. We must cut back." So they laid off the night watchman.
NOW slowly, let that sink in.
Quietly, we go like sheep to slaughter.
Does anybody remember the reason given for the establishment of the DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY..... during the Carter Administration?
Anybody?
Anything?
No?
Didn't think so!
Bottom line: We've spent several hundred billion dollars in support of an agency...the reason for which not one person who reads this can remember!
Ready?? It was very simple . . . and, at the time, everybody thought it very appropriate.
The Department of Energy was instituted on 8/04/1977 TO LESSEN OUR DEPENDENCE ON FOREIGN OIL.
Hey, pretty efficient, huh???
AND, NOW, IT'S 2011 -- 34 YEARS LATER -- AND THE BUDGET FOR THIS "NECESSARY" DEPARTMENT IS AT $24.2 BILLION A YEAR. IT HAS 16,000 FEDERAL EMPLOYEES AND APPROXIMATELY 100,000 CONTRACT EMPLOYEES, AND LOOK AT THE JOB IT HAS DONE! THIS IS WHERE YOU SLAP YOUR FOREHEAD AND SAY, "WHAT WERE THEY THINKING?"
A little over 34 years ago, 30% of our oil consumption was foreign imports. Today 70% of our oil consumption is foreign imports.
Ah, yes -- the good old Federal bureaucracy!!
NOW, WE HAVE TURNED THE BANKING SYSTEM, HEALTH CARE, AND THE AUTO INDUSTRY OVER TO THE SAME GOVERNMENT?
#3
The Atomic Energy Commission was part of DoD till the Beltway crowd decided to create DoE to 'solve' America's energy dependence at which time it was folded into the new bureaucracy to give it 'credibility'.
#4
The same thing can be said about the FDA, FCC, EPA (especially), Education, Labor, etc... They all stated with a given mission, failed miserable at it, and cost billions on billions for that failure - on and are not sacred cows which must never, ever, ever, be cut.
The single, primary purpose of the Federal Government these days is to increase the size of the Federal Government.
#7
Parkinson's Law and the Peter Principle at work. The gubmint bureaucracy is a source of politician's votes. Moreover, special interest groups such as public unions openly threaten to pull support for politicians at election time who try to reign in this mess.
#8
I recommend readers look at the front page of the Sacramento Bee today, as the article talks about serious discussion by the leaders of the state legislature and the State Treasurer, to cut the level of state funded services to those jurisdictions that do not vote to increase taxes.
Not reduce taxes commensurate with service reductions, merely to punish jurisdictions that don't support reaising taxes, while maintaining a higher lever of services to those that do. I'm not making this sh*t up, this is how public servants have become open tyrants, demanding more tax money through extortion.
#9
..except those regions which could afford to could contract out those services (self taxing) and still keep voting down government tax increases while those regions without the ability to support, while voting more taxes, would be isolated bit by bit with less and less real taxes coming in to support those services. In the end forcing the government to outright take property in a last desperate bid to survive, but in doing so 'kill the goose that lays the golden egg'. Collapse is inevitable.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Gubmint and How Gubmint Works 
