The Angry Drunk Bureaucrat: A Bureaucrat's Aside Re: Massachusetts

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."
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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, January 19, 2010

A Bureaucrat's Aside Re: Massachusetts

If there's a silver lining out there for what happened tonight in MA, it is this:

In 1994, after the "Republican Revolution," President Bill Clinton, saddled with a floundering attempt to reform health care, finally got his act together and started running a permanent campaign. While what resulted was a policy that pleased neither the right nor the left, the sudden shock after years of Democratic complacency added a new vigor to an otherwise moribund party.

What the Democrats can learn tonight is that the Race is never going to be over, no one can afford to sit on their laurels, good candidates must be identified early and effectively run, the Party must always be on the offensive, and that the base needs to be permanently energized.

Oh, and it's good that they have the chance to learn all this now and not 10 months from now.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...: An astounding spin.

It has to do with specific issue, not a lack of energy. All they had to do was read the polls about health care and climate change and they'd see that making those issues top priorities wasn't politically wise.; 8:56 AM
Not so fast said...: Anon, I really think that sounds like an outsider's perspective. I think ADB's is also a bit off the mark, but closer perhaps.

My sense is that Baystaters (aka Massholes) have grown weary and/or distrustful of a party that hasn't served them well in many areas for many years. For them, I think it goes way beyond just healthcare and global warming.; 9:47 AM
ken said...: “The great menace to the life of an industry is industrial self-complacency.”
Joyce Carol Oates; 7:48 PM
Ms. Monongahela, Ms. Chief Editor said...: Ditto what the Chinese guy said.; 12:37 AM
O said...: I think he said "Must harbor the hope that will live a happy life only flies a full, meaningful, dynamic, confident."

One of us is drunk.; 8:34 PM
Walter Jeffries said...: The good part about the MA Event is that Congress is back in gridlock. Nothing good comes of unfettered politics. Throwing in a monkey wrench slows down the legislative process and makes them think. A divided Congress passes fewer laws and that is good for the nation.; 8:20 PM

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Tuesday, January 19, 2010

A Bureaucrat's Aside Re: Massachusetts

6 comments:

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