The Angry Drunk Bureaucrat: Virginia is For Lovers (and Pennsylvania Senators Named Dick)

The Rules of Bureaucracy

Rule #O: "The Rules of Bureaucracy are mutable, non-canonical, non-ordinal, and contradictory, except in the cases where they are not."
Rule #1: "Document everything you do; if you didn't write it down, it didn't happen."
Rule #2 [The Sixty Minutes Rule]: "Never do anything that would cause Ed Bradley, Mike Wallace, Morley Safer, Steve Croft, Leslie Stahl, or even Andy Rooney to persue you down a hallway with a camera crew."
Rule #3: "Nothing Simple is Ever Easy"
Rule #4: "It's about the money; follow the money."
Rule #5: "Never ascribe to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.
Rule #6: "Politics is the enemy of good government."
Rule #7: "The biggest detriment to public service is the public."
Rule #8: "The second biggest detriment to public service is the service."
Rule #9: "There's a reason; there's ALWAYS a reason."
Rule #10: "The Law is a harsh mistress: The rigorous and exacting application of which can benefit of society when used correctly to advance good policy and block bad, and be the bane of society when used incorrectly to advance bad policy and block good."
Rule #11: "Public service often involves waking up in the morning, opening up the newspaper, and discovering that someone, somewhere out there thinks that you're a dickhead."
Rule #12: "No one really knows what you do."
Rule #13 [Luke's Rule]: "No one ever acts like the bastard they really are."
Rule #14: "Bureaucracy endures."
Rule #15: "The longer you work in bureaucracy, the more Catch-22 resembles non-fiction."
Rule #16: "Politicians are not smarter than you."
Rule #18: "Money is not created equal."
Rule #19: "Mediocrity is normalcy."
Rule #17: "Within any bureaucratic structure, resources (e.g. people, money, knowledge, etc.) are not distributed uniformly."
Rule #20: "Don't assume a fiduciary liability without a committed resource allocation."
Rule #21: "If you do your job and obey the law, they can't reasonably fire you."
Rule #22: "The Budget will always be wrong."
Rule #23: "Always sign in blue."
Rule #24: "A Bureaucrat must be able to explain and justify his/her actions to laymen without resorting to the phrase 'because the Rules say so.'"
Rule #25: "Never voluntarily relinquish control of an original document."
Rule #26: "Sometimes you just have to say 'Screw the rules'"
Rule #27: "Change sucks."
Rule #28: "Sometimes the answer is 'No.'"
Rule #29: "It is very easy to make difficult decisions when no one has a clue what's going on."
Rule #30: "If you hang around long enough, eventually you will become an expert in something."
Rule #31: "Data, technology, and automatic processes can never completely supplant human interaction."
Rule #32: "Cover thine own ass."
Rule #33: "It's not real until it has its own acronym."
Rule #34:There is nothing more dangerous than an elected, resourceful idiot.
Rule #35: It will always take longer than expected.
Rule #36: Coming Soon...

Saturday, April 16, 2005

Virginia is For Lovers (and Pennsylvania Senators Named Dick)

I just thought the choice of words and juxtaposition of ideas in this article from the Trib was interesting:

Former U.S. Rep. Doug Walgren lost the Democrats' endorsement for Allegheny County Common Pleas Court judge this spring, but he's already won something more important: top slot on the primary ballot...

The fact that he only recently moved back to Allegheny County after living in Northern Virginia hardly seems to matter. Walgren lost his seat in 1990 to Rick Santorum, who painted him as a carpetbagger. Santorum now is a U.S. senator.

Two points:
(1) The second paragraph is superfluous to the rest of the article, which is really about the role that name recognition plays in PA's election of judges, but more importantly...
(2) Do the Editors at the Pittsburgh Tribune Review know what irony is?

Why not go further? A better conclusion to the second paragraph could have been:

"Santorum is a U.S. Senator from Pennsylvania, and now lives in Northern Virginia."

"Santorum now is a U.S. Senator, and is now screwing the taxpayers of Penn Hills."

"That Dick is now a U.S. Senator."

MUST... RESIST... URGE... TO... KILL...

My soul is weary; I have to go lay in the bath for awhile, lest I have an aneurism.*

Dick!

---
*If it wasn't for the horse, I wouldn't have spent that year in college.

1 comment:

Sue London said...: Excellent Lewis Black aside. Have you gone to his website and listened to the clips? Very fun.

I'm not sure of the veracity of this story, but I remember being told once that the slogan "Virginia is for Lovers" actually started as a bit of a slur. Because Senators would keep their mistresses close by in Virginia. True? I'm not sure. But it could be...; 11:23 PM

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Saturday, April 16, 2005

Virginia is For Lovers (and Pennsylvania Senators Named Dick)

1 comment:

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