Bureaucracy

My government class started this topic a few days ago. When I was learning something in school, I used to think, "Darn, when do we actually get the apply it?" For bureaucracy, I don't think I have problem applying. Starting with my school.

A few days ago, I attended the funeral of someone I knew at school. The next day I had to submit a parent's note. When I was at the office at 7:00, you know what the secretary told me? She said, "You have to see the assistant principal at 7:30." "Ok, I shall return," I said to myself. At 7:30, I returned. There was a line in front of the counter. The secretary was working diligently..... Guess whom I saw there, the principal...... I haven't seen him in..... 3 years??? He was standing aside talking to a teacher comfortably with a cup of coffee. For a moment, I smelled the fragrance of coffee. It happened right when the secretary had to deal with a line of people. While I was looking at the chatting "couple," the teacher suddenly turned to me and asked, "What do you need?" I could only tell him why i was there. He then told me, "come back after second period, she (the assistant principal) would be back. I said ok and left with nothing accomplished. Then the principal continued his chatter with the teacher.

I eventually got to see her.. However, I am wondering, "can't the principal solve the problem with me?" Nah, he is too high-minded for that trivial matter. He had something more important, like drinking his cup of coffee and chattering with teachers, to do.. I guess it is really the sort of thing a principal should do to booster teachers' morale.

Let's talk about something more recent. Today, there was a power outage at my school at around 9:00. Certainly, the electricians arrived and tried to fix the system. Time rand fast, soon it was 9:30. The prospect of having a good school day was dim, and while all of us hoped to have school ended soon (just sitting wasn't the best thing to do), the school's principal had no authority to close the school. The school was actually calling the person in the county office who had the authority, yet he wasn't at his office. So we waited and waited, and light was on again.... While the kids were filled with immense sadness, the lights were off again....

We waited and played a few games in those boring period. Finally, at around 11:00, the school was back to normalcy, after 2 hours of nothingness. The classes ran on the 2-hour late schedule. Every class was about 25 minutes....

Bureaucracy can be good and bad, and many times it more likely exists in the government. Why? Because there is no competition. If an agency's job is privatized, different companies compete to do better to get the contract. Take NASA for example, it has a track record of failures and waste, and it is, not surprisingly, a government agency. If the job is privatized, different companies, which keep a check for one another, are inherently more efficient, because every one of them tries to keep the cost down while producing the best product. The problems of bureaucracy decrease....

When the government "sucks" at the task consistently, it becomes inevitable that it should privatize the task. Certainly, I believe that the government does have to take the initiatives on certain area, especially in scientific research, because if the government doesn't lead the effort no private company will lead the effort. For example, if the government doesn't say "ok" on stem cell research or actually fund the effort, it would be difficult for the private sector to do it unless the corporations see that the long-term benefit will be more than the short-term cost. However, for something like education, it is time for the government to..... (end the sentence for me, please.)