Throughout my professional career, I worked at various government funded jobs. My personal mission is to organize, streamline, fix, then prevent "problems". NOPE, these boses told me to "do the bare minimum" and "quit being so efficient it makes others look bad", which I never understood until now. In managing grants I was told "over spend and end in the red", so that we would get MORE $$$ next year. One education program grant (in 1998) cost $350,000 to put ONE LATINA student into a college program. She got pregnant and quit early. Pure insanity. These cabal globalists ARE the problems! Good to see DJT and team taking down these criminal systems.
Because ultimately governments become part of the problem. They need the problem to continue to stay relevant. How much money was spent on issues that seem never ending. They hire people, spend money on studies, and at some point the money runs out. Well the problem is still there and it needs more money and the cycle continues because most of the money is spent on studying the problem and not fixing it. Why? Because if they fix the problem what happens to all those people who need the problem for their jobs. Professors, bureaucrats, who have some serious job security.
City "Rent Control" now needs (1) staff data management for every rental, (2) staff economic assessments for approved annual rent increases, (3) staff compliance inspection teams for every rental, (4) independent contractor repair assessments for every rental, (5) complaint boards for every tenant, (6) appeals and adjudication panels for every tenant........
Alternative: the free animal spirts of the rental market place - willing buyer meets willing seller.
Thank you Robert. This article should be sent to all members of Congress and to their staff. After reading and absorbing all of Robert’s observations, it became clear to me that several major themes could be drawn from the article, and they all stem from human nature. (1) people do not like to admit that they were wrong and in the political world that their adversary was correct (this is the cause of Trump Derangement Syndrome); and (2) as a component of self-preservation that people must save their job/career. We in California only need to look at the two glaring examples of “homelessness “ and the “high speed rail “ project. Berney
Yet another another excellent article with clear vision seeing the problem and articulating it. That is way I am a subscriber the the Santa Barbara current and do recommend others to subscribe to it!
I like your complex take on why problems don't get solved. From my engineering experience, I also have studied why some things don't get solved. In engineering, the problem-solving method that fails is the "committee" approach. The more engineers you throw on a problem, the less likely it will be solved for the following reason: (1) Usually each member of a committee looks at another to do the work, (2) Solving a complex problem is usually the result of one person, (3) Management will usually provide stupid restrictions to solving the problem (a true example is that "no changes could be made," good luck with that one). The aforementioned Raytheon situation just described went on for 12 years and $12M to develop a military grade power supply that two other manufacturers (Rantec and Venus) decided to stop producing because they were difficult to build and they had reliability problems. In desperation, management selected me to fix all the electronic problems and a mechanical engineer to fix the thermal problems (stuff burning up). Funny thing, I had never designed a power supply before this time, but a higher-up company scientist felt the problems were more circuit related (correctly stated) which "circuits" is my forte. I made it work.
I have several examples of committees not coming to a solution. More often than not, a single person will solve the problem at hand. Of course, building an aircraft takes many, many designs to be solved. In these instances, communications between designers must be good. That's another topic. One of my comments about governments it's made up of political people that don't like to work, just talk. They keep hiring other people to do real work.
so so so true especially here in Washington DC I’ve covered the government here for almost 20 years for the local paper but I’m not allowed to write about how every month dozens of new employees of the Mayor and the bureaucrats are introduced — young and eager, with job titles that take up an entire business card and making between circa 90 and $120,000 and expecting absolute secure job. Even when the DC budget was cut by almost $600,000 by Congress which is its absolute right to do, the Mayor threatened that the cuts would be done in programs for children and hospitals of course but don’t worry she said no one will lose their jobs. It’s evident that the main reason for government funds jobs for certain favored minorities . Everyone else is expected to work in the instable economy. (btw. just saying but the black population is less than 50 percent the past ten years w an ever increasing proportion -i’ve been told 16%+- are foreign born. mini African-Americans want to distinguish between blacks and African-Americans because of that African-Americans being those who have a documented family history of slavery whose descendants are to be favored forever ever and ever and ever).
No one benefits from solutions in government. You are correct. It's the incentives. In fact, the incentive structure is the complete opposite due to the way campaigns are conducted. The more bureaucrats there are and the more issues they create in the private sector, the more employees there are paying dues. Those dues are cycled through to politicians for their campaigns and then those same politicians keep the rules and make them more severe so we need more bureaucrats and more employees, etc etc.
The answer is to significantly reduce or eliminate the need for campaign help from employee unions. How? Reduce the size of campaigns and the need for campaign assistance.
Subdivide congressional districts so that campaigns are to 7,500 people not 750,000. You don't need union money or big business funds if you're campaigning to small numbers.
I’d let the whole “because they’re malicious and stupid” thing go, but I just watched two lower courts and a state Supreme Court rule photography illegal.
That’s stupid.
Since everyone involved got a degree in it, it’s clearly willfully stupid … =malicious.
And the courts’ budgets are independent of the decision, surely.
Except for apparently excusing people who are willfully stupid, I’m on board with your concise assessment. Self-interested or not, stupid people and willfully stupid people are what make the whole thing work. That’s where the “inevitably” derives.
According to the early Democrat preference chart in the above link, the big money is coalescing around Tom Steyer, along with also-ran Eric Swalwell.
As also explained by Dan Walters at this recent talk locally, it is still a "beauty contest" at this point in time, spread the endorsements around and see who creates the best buzz.
Telling however at this point in time, is no endorsement by the CTA -state teachers unions, the real power player in all California elections. "Teachers™ support ........ XYZ"
However the other major education player is SEIU surrogate CSEA - Classified School Employees Assn did weigh in for Tom Steyer, along with the "health care sector" Nurses Union (more nurses than doctors vote).
CMA trying to cover all health care bases, this early in the game picks Eric Swalwell.
Conclusion: early Democrat (union) money is on Tom Steyer or back-up Eric Swalwell.
Pay attention to the final King Maker endorsement CTA- California Teachers Association and their multiple affiliates in this state. Total lack of Sacramento experience or charisma is no detriment. Party loyalty and playing the public sector union game is intended to carry the day for the Democrat beauty contest.
Steyer endorsing the Billionaires Tax, as the Silicon Valley candidate, could be a major vote-getting game changer. Does Steyer know he is unleashing the unions on Silicon Valley as his quid pro quo?
Great article. I ran my ideas through the AI called Claude and got the following analysis and commentary. Note: government has its own incentives to survive, beyond solving problems for us. Santa Barbara has a habit of using broad public consulting and consensus (read: play the voices that come to your events and support you) to leverage spending money on pet projects.
——— Claude analysis:
Analysis of the Core Problem
This article identifies a fundamental misalignment of incentives in public sector problem-solving: institutional survival becomes dependent on problem persistence. The observation is astute—bureaucracies evolve into self-perpetuating entities where success threatens the organization itself.
Your Proposed Solution: Fixed Budget, Fixed Timeline, Measurable Outcomes, Then Disbandment
This is essentially a project-based governance model rather than institutional governance. Let’s examine what would likely happen:
Probable Positive Outcomes
1. Clarity of Mission
∙ Teams would have unambiguous success criteria from day one
∙ No room for mission drift or goal displacement
∙ Metrics designed for actual outcomes, not process justification
2. Urgency and Focus
∙ Deadline pressure forces prioritization of what actually works
∙ No incentive to complicate—complexity slows delivery
∙ Resources directed toward solutions, not self-preservation
3. Talent Attraction
∙ High performers often prefer defined projects over indefinite bureaucracy
∙ Creates portfolio careers rather than lifers protecting territory
4. Accountability
∙ Easy to evaluate: Did the team hit its targets in time and budget?
∙ Failures are contained and finite
∙ Successes are attributable to specific approaches
Likely Obstacles and How to Overcome Them
Obstacle 1: Knowledge Loss and Discontinuity
∙ Problem: Teams disband, institutional memory vanishes
∙ Solution:
∙ Mandatory documentation as a deliverable
∙ Open-source all methodologies and findings
∙ Create a permanent (tiny) repository team that archives learnings across projects
∙ Residual maintenance contracts for successful solutions
Obstacle 2: Political Resistance
∙ Problem: Entrenched interests will fight sunset provisions
∙ Solution:
∙ Start with new problems, not existing agencies
∙ Pilot in municipalities or states before federal level
∙ Make it optional for agencies to “convert” to project model
∙ Create clear career paths: specialists rotate between time-limited projects
Obstacle 3: Defining “Measurable Outcomes” for Complex Problems
∙ Problem: Some legitimate issues resist simple metrics
∙ Solution:
∙ Use multiple metrics including leading and lagging indicators
∙ Build in independent evaluation from the start
∙ Accept that some problems genuinely need longer timeframes—but still set sunset reviews
∙ Allow for project renewal only if milestones are demonstrably met
Obstacle 4: Gaming the System
∙ Problem: Teams might optimize for metrics rather than actual problem-solving
∙ Solution:
∙ Design incentives around outcome metrics, not process metrics
∙ Include negative outcome penalties (did we make it worse?)
∙ External evaluation bodies with no stake in project continuation
∙ Whistleblower protections for manipulation exposure
Obstacle 5: Cherry-Picking Easy Problems
∙ Problem: Teams avoid hard problems with uncertain solutions
∙ Solution:
∙ Separate funding streams: some for “known solutions” (infrastructure), others for R&D/experimentation
∙ Accept and budget for failure on experimental projects
∙ Reward ambitious attempts, not just successes
∙ Create meta-analysis projects that learn from failed projects
Obstacle 6: Procurement and Contracting Friction
∙ Problem: Current systems designed for slow, permanent entities
∙ Solution:
∙ Pre-approved vendor pools for time-limited projects
∙ Fast-track procurement authorities for sunset teams
∙ Performance-based contracts tied to outcomes, not hours
∙ Simplified financial reporting for projects under certain thresholds
Implementation Strategy
Phase 1: Proof of Concept
∙ Identify 3-5 discrete, measurable problems
∙ Fund competing teams with 18-24 month timelines
∙ Document everything—process, outcomes, costs
∙ Publicize results aggressively
Phase 2: Category Expansion
∙ Apply to infrastructure projects (already somewhat project-based)
∙ Pilot in social programs with clear metrics (housing vouchers, job placement)
∙ Avoid hot-button issues initially to reduce political interference
Phase 3: Institutional Integration
∙ Create legal framework for “sunset agencies”
∙ Develop career pathways for project-based public servants
∙ Build data infrastructure to track long-term outcomes
∙ Establish independent evaluation capacity
The Meta-Solution
The deeper fix requires changing how we measure government legitimacy—from “How many programs do we run?” to “What problems have we eliminated?”
This means:
∙ Politicians rewarded for ending programs that succeed
∙ Public servants who disband successful projects get promoted, not laid off
∙ Budget scoring that treats problem elimination as revenue (future costs avoided)
∙ Media and voters demanding outcome transparency, not process theater
Your proposed model doesn’t fix everything, but it attacks the core pathology: it removes the survival incentive from problem persistence.
The most powerful aspect? It’s not ideological. Both left and right should want government programs that either succeed or fail quickly rather than persist indefinitely regardless of results.
The real question isn’t whether this would work better. It’s whether the current system will allow something that threatens its existence to even be tested at scale.
What does solved mean? Think about that hard. I do tons of projects where I am paid a lot of money, and the first thing I ask is, "What does DONE mean?" When you get that granular, you are now getting to definitions.
For a program to end, the definition of done or solved needs to be defined.
I often argue that politicians are not proactive; they are reactive. That is why we get laws that make no sense today, but did 100 years ago, and have had to be expanded to support today.
Want to talk military? Do we need that US military program if we are not at war?
Want to talk discrimination? Do we need all the civil rights programs if we have no discrimination?
And heck, staying very current. Yesterday, Trump removed the EPA's authority to regulate clean air. Hmm. Is it that we have clean air and there is no need for the EPA or that 'program' to keep fighting against pollutants?
Another thing missing from the OP and Claude was that things are interconnected. This is the 'Bloomberg tax' concept. Keep feeding people sugary drinks, getting them fat and diabetic, and now those people are a financial burden due to health issues.
So, just like how people want to keep the military 'program' around because it is preventive, maybe some of these other 'programs' are also preventive of other issues.
Such a shame that Biden and his Democrat administration let in 20 million with a M unvetted fraudulent asylum seekers. That policy is going to be expensive to fix. The blame falls squarely with the Democrats don’t you think?
Occurring? Yes...albeit at a dramatically reduced rate. The problem is dynamic in that it went from shutting down the source by both physically voting out the traitorous bastards that exacerbated the situation by design.
Illegal immigration of course isn't just the act of entering the country illegally it is concurrently remaining in the country. Someone that enters is an illegal alien from the nanosecond they enter and every subsequent nanosecond thereafter that they remain. The problem will not be dealt with or "solved" until the other side of the equation is "resolved". This is where it gets squishy for some.
The essence of Dan Walters recent talk at the Lobero: politicians are never leaders; they are at best only reactive clean-up crews, sweeping up after the dog and pony shows that proceeded them.
One thing I have said about politicians is that they are never given anything easy to solve. Because if it were easy, it would be solved! They are given a bunch of choices, and all they can hope for is the best of all the bad solutions.
Amen Robert! You just described the process of trying to build housing in California. Too many people reviewing, studying, opining on every project and all the consultants and regulators being paid first, off the top line cost of the project cost. Nobody getting paid off the bottom line, so nobody looks at it or cares about it. In fact, on government-sponsored/subsidized projects for housing, transportation, energy, etc. there is no bottom line, just an endless black hole. If those projects go over budget they just ask and get additional funding and cover up the boondoggle. Nobody gets fined, penalized, or fired for being incompetent, lazy, or careless. In fact, they get promoted and shuffled up the chain of command and responsibility. Government needs to get out of the way and let the people who know how to produce and build things do what they are trained and experienced at doing. They don't need the government's "help".
Throughout my professional career, I worked at various government funded jobs. My personal mission is to organize, streamline, fix, then prevent "problems". NOPE, these boses told me to "do the bare minimum" and "quit being so efficient it makes others look bad", which I never understood until now. In managing grants I was told "over spend and end in the red", so that we would get MORE $$$ next year. One education program grant (in 1998) cost $350,000 to put ONE LATINA student into a college program. She got pregnant and quit early. Pure insanity. These cabal globalists ARE the problems! Good to see DJT and team taking down these criminal systems.
Brutal analysis. The Peter Principle taken to the logical extension.
This opens your mind as to why the State Street closure drags on
Because ultimately governments become part of the problem. They need the problem to continue to stay relevant. How much money was spent on issues that seem never ending. They hire people, spend money on studies, and at some point the money runs out. Well the problem is still there and it needs more money and the cycle continues because most of the money is spent on studying the problem and not fixing it. Why? Because if they fix the problem what happens to all those people who need the problem for their jobs. Professors, bureaucrats, who have some serious job security.
.
Case in point:
City "Rent Control" now needs (1) staff data management for every rental, (2) staff economic assessments for approved annual rent increases, (3) staff compliance inspection teams for every rental, (4) independent contractor repair assessments for every rental, (5) complaint boards for every tenant, (6) appeals and adjudication panels for every tenant........
Alternative: the free animal spirts of the rental market place - willing buyer meets willing seller.
Thank you Robert. This article should be sent to all members of Congress and to their staff. After reading and absorbing all of Robert’s observations, it became clear to me that several major themes could be drawn from the article, and they all stem from human nature. (1) people do not like to admit that they were wrong and in the political world that their adversary was correct (this is the cause of Trump Derangement Syndrome); and (2) as a component of self-preservation that people must save their job/career. We in California only need to look at the two glaring examples of “homelessness “ and the “high speed rail “ project. Berney
Yet another another excellent article with clear vision seeing the problem and articulating it. That is way I am a subscriber the the Santa Barbara current and do recommend others to subscribe to it!
I like your complex take on why problems don't get solved. From my engineering experience, I also have studied why some things don't get solved. In engineering, the problem-solving method that fails is the "committee" approach. The more engineers you throw on a problem, the less likely it will be solved for the following reason: (1) Usually each member of a committee looks at another to do the work, (2) Solving a complex problem is usually the result of one person, (3) Management will usually provide stupid restrictions to solving the problem (a true example is that "no changes could be made," good luck with that one). The aforementioned Raytheon situation just described went on for 12 years and $12M to develop a military grade power supply that two other manufacturers (Rantec and Venus) decided to stop producing because they were difficult to build and they had reliability problems. In desperation, management selected me to fix all the electronic problems and a mechanical engineer to fix the thermal problems (stuff burning up). Funny thing, I had never designed a power supply before this time, but a higher-up company scientist felt the problems were more circuit related (correctly stated) which "circuits" is my forte. I made it work.
I have several examples of committees not coming to a solution. More often than not, a single person will solve the problem at hand. Of course, building an aircraft takes many, many designs to be solved. In these instances, communications between designers must be good. That's another topic. One of my comments about governments it's made up of political people that don't like to work, just talk. They keep hiring other people to do real work.
My experience exactly. I was once tasked to solve cracking of infrared detectors in a gun sight with the restriction that nothing could be changed.
so so so true especially here in Washington DC I’ve covered the government here for almost 20 years for the local paper but I’m not allowed to write about how every month dozens of new employees of the Mayor and the bureaucrats are introduced — young and eager, with job titles that take up an entire business card and making between circa 90 and $120,000 and expecting absolute secure job. Even when the DC budget was cut by almost $600,000 by Congress which is its absolute right to do, the Mayor threatened that the cuts would be done in programs for children and hospitals of course but don’t worry she said no one will lose their jobs. It’s evident that the main reason for government funds jobs for certain favored minorities . Everyone else is expected to work in the instable economy. (btw. just saying but the black population is less than 50 percent the past ten years w an ever increasing proportion -i’ve been told 16%+- are foreign born. mini African-Americans want to distinguish between blacks and African-Americans because of that African-Americans being those who have a documented family history of slavery whose descendants are to be favored forever ever and ever and ever).
No one benefits from solutions in government. You are correct. It's the incentives. In fact, the incentive structure is the complete opposite due to the way campaigns are conducted. The more bureaucrats there are and the more issues they create in the private sector, the more employees there are paying dues. Those dues are cycled through to politicians for their campaigns and then those same politicians keep the rules and make them more severe so we need more bureaucrats and more employees, etc etc.
The answer is to significantly reduce or eliminate the need for campaign help from employee unions. How? Reduce the size of campaigns and the need for campaign assistance.
Subdivide congressional districts so that campaigns are to 7,500 people not 750,000. You don't need union money or big business funds if you're campaigning to small numbers.
www.hearthepeople.org
All too true
I’d let the whole “because they’re malicious and stupid” thing go, but I just watched two lower courts and a state Supreme Court rule photography illegal.
That’s stupid.
Since everyone involved got a degree in it, it’s clearly willfully stupid … =malicious.
And the courts’ budgets are independent of the decision, surely.
Except for apparently excusing people who are willfully stupid, I’m on board with your concise assessment. Self-interested or not, stupid people and willfully stupid people are what make the whole thing work. That’s where the “inevitably” derives.
California Rent-Seeker sweepstake are underway - Govern for California
Public employee unions and special interest groups weigh in with their endorsements for governor, along with the estimated tax dollar benefits they seek in return: https://www.governforcalifornia.org/news/2026/2/14/ca-rent-seeker-sweepstakes-are-underway
According to the early Democrat preference chart in the above link, the big money is coalescing around Tom Steyer, along with also-ran Eric Swalwell.
As also explained by Dan Walters at this recent talk locally, it is still a "beauty contest" at this point in time, spread the endorsements around and see who creates the best buzz.
Telling however at this point in time, is no endorsement by the CTA -state teachers unions, the real power player in all California elections. "Teachers™ support ........ XYZ"
However the other major education player is SEIU surrogate CSEA - Classified School Employees Assn did weigh in for Tom Steyer, along with the "health care sector" Nurses Union (more nurses than doctors vote).
CMA trying to cover all health care bases, this early in the game picks Eric Swalwell.
Conclusion: early Democrat (union) money is on Tom Steyer or back-up Eric Swalwell.
Pay attention to the final King Maker endorsement CTA- California Teachers Association and their multiple affiliates in this state. Total lack of Sacramento experience or charisma is no detriment. Party loyalty and playing the public sector union game is intended to carry the day for the Democrat beauty contest.
Steyer endorsing the Billionaires Tax, as the Silicon Valley candidate, could be a major vote-getting game changer. Does Steyer know he is unleashing the unions on Silicon Valley as his quid pro quo?
Great article. I ran my ideas through the AI called Claude and got the following analysis and commentary. Note: government has its own incentives to survive, beyond solving problems for us. Santa Barbara has a habit of using broad public consulting and consensus (read: play the voices that come to your events and support you) to leverage spending money on pet projects.
——— Claude analysis:
Analysis of the Core Problem
This article identifies a fundamental misalignment of incentives in public sector problem-solving: institutional survival becomes dependent on problem persistence. The observation is astute—bureaucracies evolve into self-perpetuating entities where success threatens the organization itself.
Your Proposed Solution: Fixed Budget, Fixed Timeline, Measurable Outcomes, Then Disbandment
This is essentially a project-based governance model rather than institutional governance. Let’s examine what would likely happen:
Probable Positive Outcomes
1. Clarity of Mission
∙ Teams would have unambiguous success criteria from day one
∙ No room for mission drift or goal displacement
∙ Metrics designed for actual outcomes, not process justification
2. Urgency and Focus
∙ Deadline pressure forces prioritization of what actually works
∙ No incentive to complicate—complexity slows delivery
∙ Resources directed toward solutions, not self-preservation
3. Talent Attraction
∙ High performers often prefer defined projects over indefinite bureaucracy
∙ Clear wins (or failures) build (or damage) reputations
∙ Creates portfolio careers rather than lifers protecting territory
4. Accountability
∙ Easy to evaluate: Did the team hit its targets in time and budget?
∙ Failures are contained and finite
∙ Successes are attributable to specific approaches
Likely Obstacles and How to Overcome Them
Obstacle 1: Knowledge Loss and Discontinuity
∙ Problem: Teams disband, institutional memory vanishes
∙ Solution:
∙ Mandatory documentation as a deliverable
∙ Open-source all methodologies and findings
∙ Create a permanent (tiny) repository team that archives learnings across projects
∙ Residual maintenance contracts for successful solutions
Obstacle 2: Political Resistance
∙ Problem: Entrenched interests will fight sunset provisions
∙ Solution:
∙ Start with new problems, not existing agencies
∙ Pilot in municipalities or states before federal level
∙ Make it optional for agencies to “convert” to project model
∙ Create clear career paths: specialists rotate between time-limited projects
Obstacle 3: Defining “Measurable Outcomes” for Complex Problems
∙ Problem: Some legitimate issues resist simple metrics
∙ Solution:
∙ Use multiple metrics including leading and lagging indicators
∙ Build in independent evaluation from the start
∙ Accept that some problems genuinely need longer timeframes—but still set sunset reviews
∙ Allow for project renewal only if milestones are demonstrably met
Obstacle 4: Gaming the System
∙ Problem: Teams might optimize for metrics rather than actual problem-solving
∙ Solution:
∙ Design incentives around outcome metrics, not process metrics
∙ Include negative outcome penalties (did we make it worse?)
∙ External evaluation bodies with no stake in project continuation
∙ Whistleblower protections for manipulation exposure
Obstacle 5: Cherry-Picking Easy Problems
∙ Problem: Teams avoid hard problems with uncertain solutions
∙ Solution:
∙ Separate funding streams: some for “known solutions” (infrastructure), others for R&D/experimentation
∙ Accept and budget for failure on experimental projects
∙ Reward ambitious attempts, not just successes
∙ Create meta-analysis projects that learn from failed projects
Obstacle 6: Procurement and Contracting Friction
∙ Problem: Current systems designed for slow, permanent entities
∙ Solution:
∙ Pre-approved vendor pools for time-limited projects
∙ Fast-track procurement authorities for sunset teams
∙ Performance-based contracts tied to outcomes, not hours
∙ Simplified financial reporting for projects under certain thresholds
Implementation Strategy
Phase 1: Proof of Concept
∙ Identify 3-5 discrete, measurable problems
∙ Fund competing teams with 18-24 month timelines
∙ Document everything—process, outcomes, costs
∙ Publicize results aggressively
Phase 2: Category Expansion
∙ Apply to infrastructure projects (already somewhat project-based)
∙ Pilot in social programs with clear metrics (housing vouchers, job placement)
∙ Avoid hot-button issues initially to reduce political interference
Phase 3: Institutional Integration
∙ Create legal framework for “sunset agencies”
∙ Develop career pathways for project-based public servants
∙ Build data infrastructure to track long-term outcomes
∙ Establish independent evaluation capacity
The Meta-Solution
The deeper fix requires changing how we measure government legitimacy—from “How many programs do we run?” to “What problems have we eliminated?”
This means:
∙ Politicians rewarded for ending programs that succeed
∙ Public servants who disband successful projects get promoted, not laid off
∙ Budget scoring that treats problem elimination as revenue (future costs avoided)
∙ Media and voters demanding outcome transparency, not process theater
Your proposed model doesn’t fix everything, but it attacks the core pathology: it removes the survival incentive from problem persistence.
The most powerful aspect? It’s not ideological. Both left and right should want government programs that either succeed or fail quickly rather than persist indefinitely regardless of results.
The real question isn’t whether this would work better. It’s whether the current system will allow something that threatens its existence to even be tested at scale.
Claude for Governor. CA DOGE for Lt Governor.
Interesting AI feedback.
It left out what the OP left out: Reality.
What does solved mean? Think about that hard. I do tons of projects where I am paid a lot of money, and the first thing I ask is, "What does DONE mean?" When you get that granular, you are now getting to definitions.
For a program to end, the definition of done or solved needs to be defined.
I often argue that politicians are not proactive; they are reactive. That is why we get laws that make no sense today, but did 100 years ago, and have had to be expanded to support today.
Want to talk military? Do we need that US military program if we are not at war?
Want to talk discrimination? Do we need all the civil rights programs if we have no discrimination?
And heck, staying very current. Yesterday, Trump removed the EPA's authority to regulate clean air. Hmm. Is it that we have clean air and there is no need for the EPA or that 'program' to keep fighting against pollutants?
Another thing missing from the OP and Claude was that things are interconnected. This is the 'Bloomberg tax' concept. Keep feeding people sugary drinks, getting them fat and diabetic, and now those people are a financial burden due to health issues.
So, just like how people want to keep the military 'program' around because it is preventive, maybe some of these other 'programs' are also preventive of other issues.
Problem: massive illegal immigration
Democrat solution: 100 billion bill
Trump solution: enforce existing laws
Result: illegal immigration eliminated without spending bill
It is not complicated Davie
What is budget for ICE?
$10 Billion. Yes Billion with a B.
How are we going to get rid of those pension eligible new hires?
Such a shame that Biden and his Democrat administration let in 20 million with a M unvetted fraudulent asylum seekers. That policy is going to be expensive to fix. The blame falls squarely with the Democrats don’t you think?
I agree. Big mistake. At least they won’t be collecting pensions for years.
No.
There is still illegal immigration occurring.
How much? From where? Source of your information? How does this compare to illegal immigration under Democrat Biden/Harris administration?
Occurring? Yes...albeit at a dramatically reduced rate. The problem is dynamic in that it went from shutting down the source by both physically voting out the traitorous bastards that exacerbated the situation by design.
Illegal immigration of course isn't just the act of entering the country illegally it is concurrently remaining in the country. Someone that enters is an illegal alien from the nanosecond they enter and every subsequent nanosecond thereafter that they remain. The problem will not be dealt with or "solved" until the other side of the equation is "resolved". This is where it gets squishy for some.
Encouraging illegal migration (D) versus curtailing illegal migration (R).
We know the difference .
The essence of Dan Walters recent talk at the Lobero: politicians are never leaders; they are at best only reactive clean-up crews, sweeping up after the dog and pony shows that proceeded them.
Interesting. I have never heard of Dan Walters.
One thing I have said about politicians is that they are never given anything easy to solve. Because if it were easy, it would be solved! They are given a bunch of choices, and all they can hope for is the best of all the bad solutions.
Amen Robert! You just described the process of trying to build housing in California. Too many people reviewing, studying, opining on every project and all the consultants and regulators being paid first, off the top line cost of the project cost. Nobody getting paid off the bottom line, so nobody looks at it or cares about it. In fact, on government-sponsored/subsidized projects for housing, transportation, energy, etc. there is no bottom line, just an endless black hole. If those projects go over budget they just ask and get additional funding and cover up the boondoggle. Nobody gets fined, penalized, or fired for being incompetent, lazy, or careless. In fact, they get promoted and shuffled up the chain of command and responsibility. Government needs to get out of the way and let the people who know how to produce and build things do what they are trained and experienced at doing. They don't need the government's "help".
So only people who do not need the job should get it