Friday’s Fax reveals a weakness of the Civil Service setup that is used for most positions in the government now.

The Chairman of a US House subcommittee on criminal justice has charged the US Agency for International Development (USAID) with setting up a pro-prostitution group in India and lying about it to Congressional staff.

In his February 6th letter to Randall Tobias, US Global Aids Coordinator, Representative Mark Souder, goes on to charge USAID personnel with deliberately setting up a non-governmental organization (NGO) precisely to hide deliberate violations of a federal law which forbids US financial support of pro-prostitution activity.

It came to light some months ago that a group in Indian called Sampada Grameen Mahila Sansthat (SAMGRAM) was working to stop other groups from helping underage girls out of prostitution. It was further charged that SAMGRAM was receiving US financial assistance, a violation of the US Leadership Against HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria Act of 2003, which forbids US funds from being used “to promote or advocate the legalization or practice of prostitution of sex trafficking.” USAID has denied the charge and a USAID staff member told Congressional staff that such inquiries by the subcommittee were “destructive.”

In his letter, Souder says he has come into possession of documents that “prove that USAID money financed the pro-prostitution SANRAM though a second organization called Avert, which was established with the assistance of four USAID employees as a pass through entity.” He further charged in his letter that “USAID held the ex-officio Vice-Chairmanship of Avert since its inception.”

The Bush Administration has been in the leadership of global efforts to eliminate human sex trafficking. The charges demonstrate how there can be a disconnect between the wishes of an executive administration and the entrenched bureaucracy.

USAID has refused to publicly comment on the charges leveled by Representative Souder. USAID did not respond to the Friday Fax’s request for comment.^[1]

Unfortunately, this flaw was not exactly unforeseen by the “Progressives” who put it in place. I would go so far as to say it was expected. The Progressives were upset that many government positions were held by those who were incredibly unqualified to do the work they had been appointed to do. To solve this, they set up the Civil Service system. The basic idea was that a president could appoint whoever he liked to a class of job, say a ton of postal workers, and then declare it a Civil Service position. That meant that the appointment became more or less permanent, the next president would not be able to appoint someone new. The benefit to the Progressives was that after that appointed official retired (or was promoted), the next person would have to be someone who had passed the Civil Service exam and demonstrated that [s]he was qualified for the position.

From this the flaw should be evident. The entire system becomes dependent on those who have passed the test using their skills to further the Administration’s agenda rather than their own. No president declaring a position part of the Civil Service would really consider this a down side: his own friends were guaranteed tenure. The Progressives did not really consider this a downside either: They trusted those with skills more than the (often corrupt) politicians who appointed them. Politicians had, after all, proved that they did not care about the ability of an appointee to do the work.

The end result is that politicians come and go, while the career Civil Service and Foreign Service do their own thing, secure in the fact that it is very hard to fire them.

1. TheFactIs.org. “Congressman Accuses USAID of Establishing Pro-Prostitution Group in India and Lying About It” Friday Fax Volume 9, Number 8 2006-02-10. http://www.thefactis.org/default.aspx?control=ArticleMaster&aid=1481&authid=11

Mr. Dan Mitchell quotes part of a Wall Street Journal article which I cannot read, looking at the trap of state monopolies.^[1] This trap is not unique to state monopolies, though it is likely most severe there. The trap is a rather neat one: the state monopoly has no real need to be efficient. Funded on tax payer dollars, it quite likely has no concept of “profit” the way a private sector company would. This gives it greater flexibility in meeting its worker’s demands. Thus, when workers go on strike, or agitate via the political process for greater benefits, there is no point beyond which the management cannot go. You want an extra few days of leave each year? Sure, why not, your leave does not cost the company anything. This process can be slowed if the state legislature keeps tight bounds on the amount of money allocated to a given function, but as the workers become more numerous, and/or better organized, they form more powerful lobbies to influence the legislature to relax that control. The legislature can always deficit spend or raise taxes after all.

A similar process happens with unions even in very large private sector companies. The easy current example of this is United Airlines. Considered too big and too important to be allowed to fail, United is ensured of a governmental bailout if its credit ever falls through. Banks, knowing this, and also happy with their (still very high) minimum monthly payments, are more willing to grant loans than they would be to smaller companies. Thus faced with union difficulties, United is more likely to cave, granting higher benefits, higher pensions, than it can actually support. For a time this appeared to work: United had the bulk of the flights, lots of people were flying, it looked like it could afford to continue this, could continue to make its (relatively) minimal payments indefinitely. Then came a scare, and the number of passengers dropped for at least a while. Now United is basically at the mercy of the bankruptcy court, waiting for the next bailout to continue business as usual.

The state monopoly is clearly worse though. It will never face the shame and hassle of a bankruptcy court. It will never have even the nominal obligation to appear profitable. Its corruption can thus go much further, making it that much harder to undo. The quoted segment of the Wall Street Journal article makes this explicit.

The case of the state monopoly, EDF (Electricité de France) is instructive, and explains why any reform is so politically difficult. Employees of this vast organization work 32 hours per week; their meals are subsidized to the tune of 50%, their electricity and gas bills by 90%; they can retire at 55; they have the right to holidays at a fifth of their market value, and on average work the equivalent of eight months per year; and when their mother-in-law dies, they can take three days’ paid leave to celebrate. These are not all their privileges, only some; so it is hardly surprising that when the government proposed the privatization of EDF, they went on strike. (The government caved in.) They did so in the name of “the defense of public service” — and the French call the Anglo-Saxons hypocrites! When a certain critical mass of such subsidy and special privilege for important sectors of the economy is reached, reform becomes impossible without explosion. The government has created an economic monster that it cannot tame, and that is now its master. …there is an underlying anxiety (the French take more tranquillizers than any other nation).^[2]

1. Mr. Dan Mitchell. “A case study of French decline” Dan Mitchell’s C-Log 2006-02-11. http://www.townhall.com/blogs/c-log/Dan%20Mitchell/story/2006/02/11/186096.html
2. Unviewable Wall Street Journal Article quoted by the above source, and re-quoted here. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB113962625985271568.html?mod=opinion&ojcontent=otep

The poor logic of the left is quite evident in a recent post by Mr. Richard Stallman.^[1] He is complaining that a government which ignores its own laws will be able to access files on Google’s servers. His proposed solution is government regulation to prevent those files being on Google’s servers in the first place. Why a government intent on violating civil liberties would enforce such a law is left up to the reader’s imagination.

1. Mr. Richard Stallman. “Google Desktop Search” Political Notes 2006-02-11. http://www.stallman.org/archives/2005-nov-feb.html#12%20February%202006%20%28Google%20Desktop%20Search%29

Last week I wrote about how it is a mistake to add fuel to the fire over the badly thought out reaction to cartoons mocking Muhammad and Islam.^[1] This week, I read Mr. Pat Buchanan doing much the same, using other, but equally cogent, reasons.^[2] Actually, some of his logic is rather similar to mine, he just goes on at greater length and has as his starting point security here at home rather than concerns over freedom of rather than freedom from religion. His article is well worth reading if (as is likely) my commentary was incoherent and/or unconvincing

1. Mr. Luke Schierer. “On Offensive Cartoons, Protests, and Counter-protests” Random Unfinished Thoughts 2006-02-10. https://www.schierer.org/~luke/log/20060210-1102/on-offensive-cartoons-protests-and-counter-protests
2. Mr. Pat Buchanan. “The cartoon wars” WorldNetDaily 2006-02-11. http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=48786

This week, as Muslims have rioted, burned, bombed, and closed newspapers in responce to some offensive cartoons, a contrast becomes evident. So evident that even Mrs. Michelle Malkin, who has helped fuel the fires (more on that in a moment), has noted it.^[1] Ms. Jennifer Siegel writes more on this contrast, expanding on the unjust nature of a comparison of Catholic protests of offensive speach and Muslim protests.^[2] In short, we have been peaceful, while they have not only threatened death and distruction, but have carried out those threats. If you cannot see a difference there, a hugely significant one, then I submit that you really are not capable of rational discussion.

We do ourselves no favors however, either in a push to advance free speach nor in a push for conversion, when we fan the flames of Muslim militancy as Mrs. Malkin has done. Mr. Alejandro Bermudez explains why.^[3] Any attack on religion, any religion, as a religion is a threat to all of us. The same papers in which these cartoons originated are equally well known for attacking Catholics. Further, to replublish these cartoons is not going to help convince Muslims to be less violent, nor is it going to help convert them to the true faith. This is not an example of evangelization nor of apologetics. It is simply attacking a religion for no reason other than the fact that that faith is an easy target right now.

While we clearly cannot give in to threats of violence, we also should not be eager to spread these cartoons. We should find other ways to encourage free speach in the face of this attack on it. For the surpression of these cartoons is equally unproductive, done in the manner currently attempted. Far from a peaceful protest aimed at demonstrating the poor logic of publishing them, these attacks are aimed at silencing all critisim and all dissent. This was not an effective tatic durring the age of the Inquisition, nor is it effective now. A boycot or a peaceful protest works by reminding publishers where their money comes from. It does not make economic sense to offend your customer base. It makes them remember you and your concerns without fearing you or hating you. A death threat or a bomb threat can also work, in the sense that you can stop publishers from publishing, but you do so by making them fear and hate you. You convince them of the truth of the material you surpress even as you surpress it. This means that, in the long run, more of that material will be produced. It will just be distributed differently.

1. Mrs. Michelle Malkin. “Catholics Insulted, Peace Reigns” www.michellemalkin.com 2006-02-09. http://michellemalkin.com/archives/004522.htm
2. Ms. Jennifer Siegel. “Catholic Activist: Extremist Comparisons Unfair” www.forward.com 2006-02-10. http://www.forward.com/articles/7329
3. Mr. Alejandro Bermudez. “Don’t get too exited about Muslim bashing” Catholic Outsider 2006-02-04. http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/blog/?p=108

The Electronic Frontier Foundation(EFF), the Electronic Privacy Information Center(EPIC), the American Civil Liberties Union(ACLU) and others are fighting an attempt to extend the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA).^[1] I believe this fight, though worthy, is doomed to failure. Someone will raise the terrorism issue, how terrorists could use VoIP to avoid detection, and it will be downhill from there.

Which raises the question (Mr.?) Uwe Hermann asks.^[2] Given that CALEA will be extended, and that hackers will take advantage of whatever backdoors are introduced, how do we handle this? How can we detect what backdoors are available and defend against them?

1. Mr. Dennis O’Reilly. “Could Your VoIP Phone Be Tapped?” Washington Post (online) 2006-01-28. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/27/AR2006012701086.html
2. (Mr.?) Uwe Hermann. “How to detect and defeat hardware backdoors and wiretaps?” Blog and homepage of a slightly paranoid Debian developer 2006-02-08. http://www.hermann-uwe.de/blog/how-to-detect-and-defeat-hardware-backdoors-and-wiretaps

A first grader was suspended from school for sexual harassment.^[1] I am very tempted to agree with his mother in saying there is no way a first grader could understand sexual harassment. Her explanation makes far more sense. If he did however, it can only be because of the sexualization of life that we expose our children to on television, in the movies, and most importantly in our misguided attempts to protect them from just such abuse.

We need to wake up to the fact that a child is not responsible, cannot be responsible, for protecting his or her self from predators. It is the responsibility of adults to ensure that a child never need do so.

1. Associated Press. “First Grader Suspended for Harassment” www.brietbart.com 2006-02-08. http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/02/08/D8FL3EGO0.html

Sometimes I wonder if people practice being logically inconsistent. Mr. Richard Stallman is my latest example of stupidity. He claims he supported the war on Afghanistan “because the Taliban were horrible,”^[1] but does not support the war in Iraq, where the Kurds were being killed and gassed by their own ruler. The hypocrisy is mind boggling.

1. Mr. Richard Stallman. “Afghanistan 5 years after” Political notes 2006-02-04. http://www.stallman.org/archives/2005-nov-feb.html#04%20February%202006%20%28Afghanistan%205%20years%20after%29