Government approved waste

I went up to a friend's house today. Steve was putting in some concrete barriers as a retaining wall. They were stacked along the county road's right of way, on Steve's property. A county road inspector came along, saw the barriers in a neat stack and had a cow. She parked in Steve's driveway, and ordered the work stopped.

The road inspector insisted on seeing all of Steve's paperwork. This particular dim-witted government "worker" didn't know what a permit looked like, so she summoned her boss, and two or three other county employees. It was Saturday, so they took a while to get there. Meanwhile, the construction company's equipment and workers are all idle; the meter continues to run.

Finally the others arrived. Steve spread out all his work permits and engineering reviews, along with the tax and fee receipts. The experienced county employees took a look at the paperwork and saw all was in order. The road inspector disputed the paperwork with her boss and the others. After another half an hour, the county road manager announced the construction company could resume and said everyone should start back to work. He would explain the situation to the road inspector. He went off to face her, wearing the unhappy face of someone forced to suffer a fool.

The point of the story? Micromanagement wastes resources. The new county road inspector is an Obama "stimulus" hireling.

This time and resource wasting method is coming to a hospital near you. It doesn't take much imagination to realize how medicine will be impacted. Dawdling while checking paperwork will interfere with proper treatment. Politically obsequious meddling will destroy lives.

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The competitive, capitalist economy is based on qualification. The worker who knows how to do something gets the job doing it. No system is perfect, so sometimes the worker's skill is mismatched to the job.

Under the politically correct system, the worker who knows someone gets the paycheck. The job may not get done, but the costs will continue to mount. No economic system can last long if it is based on sycophantic toadyism.

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"... The same revolutionary beliefs for which our forebears fought are still at issue around the globe--the belief that the rights of man come not from the generosity of the state but from the hand of God."
-- John F. Kennedy, 1961