You know that for years, one of the cornerstones of rightie civic religion is that private is always better than public. The rightie answer to all government problems has been (after cutting taxes) to first deregulate, then privatize. Righties have a pure and abiding faith that public bureaucracies are wasteful and stupid and corrupt, while private companies are efficient and competent and always do the job better, whatever that job is.
SNIP
Last week the New York Times published a series of articles on the salvage effort that rebuilt the Pacific Fleet after the Japanese attack at Pearl Harbor. These serve as a reminder of what government — transparent government, accountable government — can accomplish. Compare the work at Pearl Harbor one year after the attacks, as reported at the time by Robert Trumbell, to New Orleans today. And weep.
It's a very interesting article, especially as we start to grapple with "what should the government do, and how should it do that job."
2 comments:
Invalid comparison. Our culture at that time was very different. Government after WWII was not known as the great caretaker that it is today. Society didn't depend on government as it does today. Today, government is the greatest aggregator of power and money and, yes, that power is a corrupting influence today unlike it was in 1946.
Government does nothing well. I used to think that it did an OK job with roads...until the "Big Dig."
To my point, here is a reference from your Mahablog:
"Professor Krugman continues,
In Afghanistan, the job of training a new police force was outsourced to DynCorp International, a private contractor, under very loose supervision: when conducting a recent review, auditors couldn’t even find a copy of DynCorp’s contract to see what it called for. And $1.1 billion later, Afghanistan still doesn’t have an effective police training program."
"under very loose supervision" seems to be the operative phrase here, not "private contractor" as Krugman would have you believe. Anyone that would let a $1.1 billion contract out with "loose supervision" is the at-fault party. I assure you that no private company would invest $1.1 billion in a project with "loose supervision."
Are you sure you want the feds to manage your healthcare? What do you think a $1.7 TRILLION contract with "loose supervision" would look like after a couple of years?
PS Can't you find a more honest and objective source than Krugman?
I want the feds to manage healthcare as I am self-employed and pay $1700 a month for me and one employee.
It's different when the money comes out of your own pocket.
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