Monday, October 10, 2011

Dead Horse Theory, or How Government Works

If you  don't understand this theory, you haven't lived long  enough. 
 
The tribal wisdom of the Dakota Indians, passed on from  generation to generation, is that when you discover you are riding a  dead horse, the best strategy is to dismount.
However, in government and throughout the public service sector more advanced strategies often are employed, such  as: 
1.  Buying a stronger whip.
2.  Changing riders. 
3.  Appointing a committee to study the horse.
4.  Arranging to visit other countries to see how other cultures ride dead horses -- politicians love this  one.
5.  Lowering the standards so that dead horses can be included. 
6.  Reclassifying the dead horse as living-impaired. 
7.  Hiring outside contractors to ride the dead horse. 
8.  Harnessing several dead horses together to increase speed.
9.  Providing additional funding and/or training to increase dead horse's performance. 
10. Doing a productivity study to see if lighter riders would improve the dead horse's performance.
11. Declaring that, since the dead horse does not have to be  fed, it is less costly, carries lower overhead and therefore contributes substantially more to the bottom line of the  economy than do some other horses.
12. Rewriting the expected performance requirements for all horses.
And, of course, this highly favored government tactic: 
13. Promoting the dead horse to a supervisory position.

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