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BS ‘n’ About…
Mandarinization
Imperial China was administered for centuries by a mandarin bureaucracy that was, in theory, recruited on merit and promoted on performance. The idea was to find the best and brightest at an early age and nurture them to efficiently run the empire. Promising students were placed in special schools, received career-specific training, and were formally tested regularly. No child left behind!
Admittedly, this was a system of governance that worked much better in theory than in practice. As with most of man’s systems, it’s ideals collapsed due to patronage, corruption, and greed. But it is an ideal that we would do well to reflect back upon, an ideal better suited to a democratic America than to an Imperial China.
In 21st century America the only safe jobs are those with the government. The Peter Principle rules. Actions which would be cause for firing, or even indictment, out here in the real world are business as usual for those whose job it is to spend our money. Five hundred dollar toilet seats foster million dollar investigations with the taxpayer picking up the tab for both.
Our government needs to start being held accountable for how it is spending our money. We need to streamline things. We need to come to a fair determination of what a toilet seat ought to cost, then tie the Commisar of Toilets compensation to that number. We need to quit paying somebody’s brother-in-law to re-invent the wheel.
As tax paying citizens, we’re tired of seeing three-fourths of our tax dollars leaning on their shovels every time we pass a road crew. We’re tired of standing in line at the DMV while they process things behind the counter as slowly and inefficiently as possible. Most of all, we’re tired of Congress taking money out of our grandkids pockets to fund their latest lying efforts to get re-elected.
Instituting some sort of a ‘mandarin’ system of recruitment, education, compensation and promotion should start from within. Set up an impartial panel to judge inefficiencies, then get the Supreme Court out of the way of the whistleblowers. Give a percentage of the savings to those who root out the excesses. Provide financial incentive to spend our money wisely. Fire the unproductive deadweight and bring the corrupt to justice. If that sounds like a witchhunt, that’s because that’s what it is. …because that’s what we need. Five hundred dollar toilet seats, my ass!
Once we make those who are paid by our tax dollars accountable to us, the taxpayers, we will have laid the foundation for changing the whole culture of greed, corruption, and cheating that has become so prevalent these days. Why should the concept of getting good value for our tax dollars seem so revolutionary?
We need to start recruiting bright people at an early age for government service, for everything from the DMV to the judiciary, then make them accountable to us instead of the politicians. Until we do, we’re going to continue watching our tax dollars flushed down the toilet: the one with the five hundred dollar seat.
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