Tag Archives: bureaucracy
Battle To Watch: Trump Versus the “We Be’s”
There are a lot of hot battles to watch out for in 2017. President Trump versus Congress. President Trump versus the press. President Trump versus the Democrats. President Trump versus the Chinese, Mexico, Iran, and the Islamic State. But one of the potentially most explosive of all will be Trump versus the bureaucracy. The executive branch civilian workforce numbers about 2.7 million; the uniformed military are another 1.5 million. Against that more or less permanent federal workforce of roughly 4 million people, President Trump gets to fill maybe 4,000 jobs. A lecturer at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, Robert Behn, writes about this as “the law of diminishing control: the larger any organization becomes, the weaker is the control over its actions exercised by those at the top.” He says bureaucrats speak of “residents” and “tourists” — the residents are the bureaucrats, the tourists are political appointees, just passing through. Or, Behn writes, a member of the permanent government refers to himself or herself as a “We Be” — as in, “We be here before you’re here. We be here after you’re here.” Read the story here 11:36
The Observer Program. Expanded
The US Fishing industry is the most scrutinized industry in the Nation. In another article today regarding the Mount Polley mine tailings pond dam breach, a fishermen’s representative laments, “We have fleets of boats with observers or cameras watching our every move to fish sustainably, and nobody is watching these folks as they destroy our ecosystem,” I would like to expand the conversation regarding oversight of the regulators,,, <Read more here> 19:50
It’s a libertarian’s wet dream: With President Obama and Congress on vacation, we’re safe from government. Now, go read the Federal Register.
Washington’s secret rulebook It’s the daily compendium of proposed rules, regulations and decisions by government agencies. It never heads to Martha’s Vineyard and isn’t read by 99% of Washington reporters. But it’s testament to the unceasing impact of government and proof of where the real power resides: in the bureaucracy. more@nydailynews23:09:49
