And Now For A Really Sticky Topic...

        No, it's not Debate Day.  On Tossing It Out Debate Day is on Thursday--that's when I sometimes bring up some really sticky topics.  Today I have a sticky topic of a different nature.  However, let me preface by noting that if all levels and offices of federal, state, and local governments in the United States were businesses most of them would have gone under years ago. If government were actually operated like a business things would be a lot different.

        On Tuesdays I often do reviews, so today I'd like to offer an extremely superficial review of government offices in the United States.  Now I know I have some readers who work for some kind of governmental office and I'm sure this is not directed toward you because any reader of this blog could only be a high quality individual with  good ethics and work habits.  This rant review is directed toward those government workers who would be too ignorant to read a blog or just don't care about the quality of their work.  This is the anti-paean to the slovenly workers who suck up the hard-earned money you and I pay in taxes.

          This will not even touch those members of the executive, legislative, and judicial branch of the government who are supposed to be serving us.  That's a whole different topic.  And this certainly doesn't include any of our terrific military personnel who do such a great job keeping this country safe.  I'm just talking about the regular employed workers out there who are supposedly providing a service but are doing it poorly.  So before I begin let me apologize to all you good, honest, caring workers (you know who you are) and say this is not about you, but it's about some of your co-workers (you probably know who they are) and some of the incompetent decision-makers on the upper levels. 

        As an aside I should say I've gotten way off track from the topic  I was planning on talking about today, but it can wait.  What first inspired the direction of todays off-the-track post was an experience in the Post Office last week.  I was going to buy some stamps and I was mislead-- or perhaps just misinformed.  Whatever it was it was wrong. 

        When I buy stamps, I just buy one "book" at a time.  It's not really a "book" it's a small card of stamps. Since I buy in small quantities I always request the commemeratives (the pretty stamps).  On this visit the employee at the counter convinced me that I should buy the "Forever Stamps" (the ones that are good for any price hike in the future) because the prices were going to go up soon.  I took the bait and bought the "Forevers".  I have dealt with this lady at the Post Office before and she seems like a nice enough person so I trusted her.   What I forgot to ask was how much of an increase there was going to be.

      Later, I went to the United States Postal Service website to get info about the increase but there was nothing about any increase of first class letter rates.  I called the 800 number--they said there would be no increase this year.  Who do I believe?  The lady at the Post Office had a whole story--a sales pitch--complete with a poster of upcoming stamps and how they weren't keeping many 44 cent stamps in their inventory because the new stamps would be coming soon.  Now I'll be having the Liberty Bell on all of my outgoing mail for the next few weeks when I could have had the Simpsons and Chinese New Year.  I love the Liberty Bell and all, but on every darn letter?

     And this right after a couple of unpleasant visits to the California Department of Motor Vehicles.  I'm sure we all have unpleasant DMV stories no matter what state we're in, but in California we have the added unpleasantness of the employee furlough days so the incompetent California government can save money to pay for the legislators.  At the rate they are handing out drivers licenses to illegals they should just give all of us legal folks a license that will last us the rest of our lives so we don't have to deal with the DMV anymore. And don't even bring the Smog Testing scam--I'm sure Al Gore loves this one.  The next scam the CA thieves of government want to impose is tire inflation testing -- I can hardly wait.  Instead of worrying about the air in our tires, they should be worrying about the hot air in the windbags in Sacramento who are trying to run our lives.

      But the actual thing that really ticked me off was a recent report that baggage loss for air travelers had gone down due to increased scrutiny of all baggage handlers.  The airline employees were responsible for some losses, but the biggest concern had been theft by employees of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA).   Excuse me?   Am I missing something here?  The folks that are supposed to be providing security to us fliers may be possibly stealing things out of our suitcases.   What kind of security is that?  If a TSA employee can take things out of our suitcases can't they put a bomb in one if they want to?  Here we are lined up like cattle getting thoroughly examined like criminals and some Somalian with known terrorist ties merrily hops on board with a bomb in his underpants.  It just makes me wonder if the TSA is screening the right people.

          Now please don't get me wrong.  I love my country and the United States government does many things efficiently.  I seem to get all of my mail in a timely manner and the roads are better here than they are in a lot of places.  I've never personally had to grease the palm of any public official although I'm sure some of that is being done at some level and probably mostly by corporations and lobbyists.  I've got my power, water, and televison so I guess regulation is under control.  As long the bread and circuses keep us all happy we should thank our governments.

         Stayed tuned for next Tuesday's post:  And Now For the Sticky Topic I Meant to Talk about Last Week But Got Carried Away Complaining About Things I Probably Can't Do That Much About.....

God Bless America