The Angry Drunk Bureaucrat: A Bureaucrat's Aside - Prince of Wales Trophy Edition

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...

Tuesday, May 26, 2009

A Bureaucrat's Aside - Prince of Wales Trophy Edition

You know, as much as I loved seeing a four game sweep, I can't help but think that secretly Dan Onorato is weeping over the loss of the drink tax revenue that the county will not receive from a prolonged series.

(And just imagine the capital outlay that would have to happen for a victory parade! Two in one year? We could break the region's coffers!)

I'm sure there are very intelligent people out there that can do this kind of math on revenue lost, but frankly I'm still trying to explain the concept of "icing" to the youngins.

4 comments:

Bram Reichbaum said...: Maybe we're not giving the Pirates enough credit.; 12:11 AM
fester said...: Yeah, but the SEA has already met their additional play-off game surcharge revenue target for this year and next year (their budget counts on at least 4 home play-off sell-outs to pay off the bond obligations) as the Pens are guaranteed at least 10 home play-off dates this year! YEAH bond geekery!; 8:34 AM
MH said...: My budget counts on at least four occasions of neighbors with nice nice car stereos forgetting to lock their cars at night.; 9:01 AM
O said...: The Pirates still playing? Hmmm. Learn something new every day.; 9:57 PM

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Tuesday, May 26, 2009

A Bureaucrat's Aside - Prince of Wales Trophy Edition

4 comments:

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