George Rebane

Ending ‘Market-Based Government’ is a banner for Obama’s reform of government procurements from the private sector – especially in the defense sector.  The media elevated ‘outrages’ by service contractors like KBR and Blackstone in Iraq during the Bush years made a big impact on an electorate historically constrained.  Nobody remembers or has read about what went on during the nation’s real wars (WW2, Korea, and Vietnam), and, of course, the longest of them all – the Cold War.  Problems with government procuring things it needs have not gotten any better since George Washington had his troubles with the Continental Congress.  Government procurement people are sinecured bureaucrats pounded on mercilessly by politicians, end-users (e.g. military), and the contractors.  They are not involved in the excitement of development or the satisfaction of end-use, they never get credit for cutting a ‘good deal’ and are therefore experts at shedding blame for problems caused by their administrivia – they are the “bean counters”, despised by all.  It’s an ongoing bad situation and it won’t get any better no matter the grandstanding of the politician du jour.  We will still buy the $600 toilet seats, and a contracted security service mix-up will still cause the occasional politically embarrassing incident.  But to think that expanding government to provide some of these services ‘in-house’ is going to be more efficient or cheaper is just a lost lesson that has to be relearned at great expense.  (I was a DoD contractor for twenty years and have since stayed in touch with colleagues still in harness.)

Continuing to reject skilled workers.  The recent stimulus (here ‘SP787’) was not read by anybody and contains little poison pills that will make themselves known as this recession plays out.  One just discovered is a provision – Employ American Workers Act – which prevents an employer of highly skilled workers from importing them under the already stingy strictures of the H1-B visa program unless he can guarantee that he won’t lay off high skilled Americans in the interval.  In short, the government becomes the final arbiter of what skill sets and which individuals an employer in the daily grind of market competition should keep and could hire (more here and here).  RR readers are familiar with the brain-drain problems in our country’s wealth generating industries.  The graphic used in the last post on this may have seemed a little over-the-top, but perhaps re-evaluated in this new light … .

On a more enlivening note, belief in God is now identified with brain areas “that have evolved most recently”.  So take heart all you religious knuckle-draggers out there who have been told how ante-deluvian your beliefs are; you are really displaying that your wetware (aka ‘meat servo’ for you techies) has the latest and greatest add-on, and it’s fully functional.  New Scientist reports that –

National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke researchers found from fMRI brain scans that religious beliefs “light up” the areas that have evolved most recently, such as those involved in imagination, memory and “theory of mind” — the recognition that other people and living things can have their own thoughts and intentions.

More here – ‘Theory of mind’ could help explain belief in God.