Why I’m leaving 18F(medium.com)
medium.com
Why I’m leaving 18F
https://medium.com/@noahkunin/why-im-leaving-18f-48970131d547
8 comments
"This stuff happened before at a smaller scale by everyone," is a terrifying argument of normalization. It was wrong then. The norms were to crack down on that sort of thing when it happened. Now it's an excuse because the past wasn't perfect that we should normalize the worst excesses of wrongness as the new right. That's frightening.
I think you've read something into the GP that wasn't there. I don't see them justifying or excusing bad practices anywhere in the post. Merely stating that they occurred (which is true).
> The norms were to crack down on that sort of thing when it happened
This what the GP is really getting at. This was never cracked down on in the past (I have no clue where you'd get the idea from that it was) because it wasn't done in the open as it is now. Now that it's blatant, we may finally have an opportunity to fight it.
> The norms were to crack down on that sort of thing when it happened
This what the GP is really getting at. This was never cracked down on in the past (I have no clue where you'd get the idea from that it was) because it wasn't done in the open as it is now. Now that it's blatant, we may finally have an opportunity to fight it.
> This what the GP is really getting at. This was never cracked down on in the past (I have no clue where you'd get the idea from that it was) because it wasn't done in the open as it is now.
It wasn't done in the open because all kinds of structures, both formal and informal, were erected to crack down on it after the last time it was done so flagrantly in the open; OTOH, those have been systematically eroded over the last several decades so that with the political branches sand judiciary all in the hands of the same faction, they no longer function to restrain it.
It wasn't done in the open because all kinds of structures, both formal and informal, were erected to crack down on it after the last time it was done so flagrantly in the open; OTOH, those have been systematically eroded over the last several decades so that with the political branches sand judiciary all in the hands of the same faction, they no longer function to restrain it.
Even if the GP wasn't explicitly justifying or excusing bad practices, I was pointing out that this very much is a justification and excuse we see a lot. It's a logical fallacy that has creepily become a dominant force in a lot of politics lately.
> This what the GP is really getting at. This was never cracked down on in the past (I have no clue where you'd get the idea from that it was) because it wasn't done in the open as it is now. Now that it's blatant, we may finally have an opportunity to fight it.
We have books now on the subject to even talk about it, and having that knowledge open helps to prevent the next one done in secret. That's not a very visceral "crack down", but it has been often considered sufficient, at least in the past, in the cases where the best we can do is post-hoc handling of the situation and further attempts at prevention.
Yes, it's easier to fight things in the light, but don't mistake blatant violations for "light". The goal posts for the fight move when it is so blatant; the risks are that normalization happens and "oh well, this terrible thing is how things are done now" becomes true. Blatant acts mean the aggressors get to hold the light and control the narrative of what they point at. "We are doing nothing wrong, see, look at all this not wrong we are doing."
> This what the GP is really getting at. This was never cracked down on in the past (I have no clue where you'd get the idea from that it was) because it wasn't done in the open as it is now. Now that it's blatant, we may finally have an opportunity to fight it.
We have books now on the subject to even talk about it, and having that knowledge open helps to prevent the next one done in secret. That's not a very visceral "crack down", but it has been often considered sufficient, at least in the past, in the cases where the best we can do is post-hoc handling of the situation and further attempts at prevention.
Yes, it's easier to fight things in the light, but don't mistake blatant violations for "light". The goal posts for the fight move when it is so blatant; the risks are that normalization happens and "oh well, this terrible thing is how things are done now" becomes true. Blatant acts mean the aggressors get to hold the light and control the narrative of what they point at. "We are doing nothing wrong, see, look at all this not wrong we are doing."
Accepting reality as it is is not "normalization", it's just avoiding self-deception.
Accepting reality and feeling like there is nothing you can do about it is the very definition of "normalization". You can accept reality, feel that it's flaws are not "normal", and still strive to make it better and more normal.
Accepting reality and feeling like there is nothing you can do about it is the very definition of "normalization".
Exactly. Except that second part is nowhere in the first post.
Exactly. Except that second part is nowhere in the first post.
Maybe useful analogy: "normal" here is used not as a synonym for reality but more in the way that it is used in computing, especially things like database architecture. I like to make my databases as normalized as I can. Doesn't mean that sometimes trade-offs don't result in realities/databases that aren't as normal as I would like.
> The author conflates norms for appearances.
The management of appearances is a reflection of the prevailing social norms.
No one hides the fact that they drink water, because there is no norm that says drinking water is socially unacceptable.
And even though we all know that folks make a living selling illegal drugs, there is still a big difference between drug dealers doing business in a vacant lot at 2am, vs drug dealers doing business openly in front of a school on a busy street at 9am. If they don't feel the need to hide, that says a lot about the surrounding society.
In the recent past, people did hide their most egregious acts of political nepotism and corruption. Why? Because they violated social norms. Trump doesn't feel the need to, and yes, that is a significant change.
Now the surrounding society needs to decide whether to tolerate it, thereby creating a new norm, or enforce the existing norm.
The management of appearances is a reflection of the prevailing social norms.
No one hides the fact that they drink water, because there is no norm that says drinking water is socially unacceptable.
And even though we all know that folks make a living selling illegal drugs, there is still a big difference between drug dealers doing business in a vacant lot at 2am, vs drug dealers doing business openly in front of a school on a busy street at 9am. If they don't feel the need to hide, that says a lot about the surrounding society.
In the recent past, people did hide their most egregious acts of political nepotism and corruption. Why? Because they violated social norms. Trump doesn't feel the need to, and yes, that is a significant change.
Now the surrounding society needs to decide whether to tolerate it, thereby creating a new norm, or enforce the existing norm.
But the practices are the same either way.
Right, which is a big fucking problem. You're basically saying that the author was just naiive and that this is how it's worked all along. Which is true, and even more cause for concern.
I left the government in 2015 because I recognized the same and didn't want to be part of it. The history of actually affecting change from the inside is dismal. In fact the government, in practice and enshrined by the constitution is REACTIONARY. It reacts based on what the people decide - either through voting (rarely impactful) or through money/influence (usually the case). As you said, how it's always been.
So if you want to influence the government, any government, then you get power outside of the system and leverage it against the government.
Right, which is a big fucking problem. You're basically saying that the author was just naiive and that this is how it's worked all along. Which is true, and even more cause for concern.
I left the government in 2015 because I recognized the same and didn't want to be part of it. The history of actually affecting change from the inside is dismal. In fact the government, in practice and enshrined by the constitution is REACTIONARY. It reacts based on what the people decide - either through voting (rarely impactful) or through money/influence (usually the case). As you said, how it's always been.
So if you want to influence the government, any government, then you get power outside of the system and leverage it against the government.
I worked in state and city campaigns for a number of years, and I just wanted to confirm what you've written: that patronage and loyalty testing IS at the center (among other things) of high-level political operations. It's a cynical view, for sure, but politics is a cynical business for the most part. (Or at least that was my experience and observation.)
For many years I've observed an out-of-sight-out-of-mind approach by the citizenry towards the darker side of politics (beyond partisan horse racing and gotchas). No real demand for investigatory journalism, because who wants to pay for that? As long as "appearances were kept up" citizens seemed to dismiss the dirty stuff in favor of the shallow Gotcha Debates. Very frustrating to see corruption and/or neglect being ignored by the voter base in favor of Bread and Circus politics.
The fact that Trump is just making this more obvious has a lot of people stirring about how this is a new phenomenon, when what's happening is that the machinations are being exposed more willingly by the current regime. It's difficult to shake up a world view when appearances suddenly don't matter (in a traditional sense).
Wake up please! Still have some sunlight left.
For many years I've observed an out-of-sight-out-of-mind approach by the citizenry towards the darker side of politics (beyond partisan horse racing and gotchas). No real demand for investigatory journalism, because who wants to pay for that? As long as "appearances were kept up" citizens seemed to dismiss the dirty stuff in favor of the shallow Gotcha Debates. Very frustrating to see corruption and/or neglect being ignored by the voter base in favor of Bread and Circus politics.
The fact that Trump is just making this more obvious has a lot of people stirring about how this is a new phenomenon, when what's happening is that the machinations are being exposed more willingly by the current regime. It's difficult to shake up a world view when appearances suddenly don't matter (in a traditional sense).
Wake up please! Still have some sunlight left.
>> I've interviewed for an executive branch position where having voted years prior for the opposite party disqualified me
How the hell does the interviewer (or anyone) know who you voted for? What's the point of calling it a secret ballot if it's legal to get the answer out of you in an interview.
How the hell does the interviewer (or anyone) know who you voted for? What's the point of calling it a secret ballot if it's legal to get the answer out of you in an interview.
I actually wonder if he meant he either (1) contributed to a candidate for a party, or if (2) he's on the record of voting while registered under a particular party affiliation. Those are all part of the public record, I think.
The difference between Trump and all recent presidents is the degree of damage he does with his actions. It's not just a tiny bit more pushing the envelope, as I think your comments suggest. It's just wholesale cynical ignoring of reality. There was so much complaining about Hillary Clinton working on President Bill Clinton's health care, but she didn't have power, she was not employed, she was not sent off to work on 10 things she had no background in, unlike real estate investor and rich kid kushner. There is nepotism to a tremendous degree without any consideration, with the president's daughter, son in law working directly in govt positions, with security clearance. Also the loyalty pledges. HRC was not paid. Trump is in a different ballgame.
Reminds me of this quote supposedly said by Andrew Jackson: “If you have a job in your department that can't be done by a Democrat, then abolish the job."
Trump has repeatedly praised Jackson, so there may be a reason for that...
To generalize on your last point, the only way that blame and responsibility can possibly be conserved quantities is if they're both zero. If a system has 10 failsafes and fails regardless, then all ten of those failsafes have total responsibility for the failure. There is no reason to conserve your outrage.
I don't really find this post to be rational. 18F started out as a part of the executive office of the president. Their whole recruiting pitch revolved around the ego boost of the proximity to power. It was later moved under the umbrella of the GSA.
Nothing described in this blog post with respect to 18F is exceptional or abnormal. The heads of major agencies and their sub components have always been political appointees. Government agencies reorganize internally constantly. 18F started out life being run by a political appointee and has previously been reorganized from the EOP to the GSA. The only difference now is that the OP doesn't care for the politics of the current administration.
Nothing described in this blog post with respect to 18F is exceptional or abnormal. The heads of major agencies and their sub components have always been political appointees. Government agencies reorganize internally constantly. 18F started out life being run by a political appointee and has previously been reorganized from the EOP to the GSA. The only difference now is that the OP doesn't care for the politics of the current administration.
For an example of how incompetent the GSA is, and why moving 18F underneath it was such a crap idea, look no further than the 2012 Oversight hearing on "Addressing GSA's Culture of Wasteful Spending":
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R0oekP6OGbo
The GSA is a living, breathing oxymoron. They try to simplify government purchasing by making 999 rules and hoops to jump through, burning through cash and taking a percentage of every contract put through the organization. It's a giant cancerous scam that was allowed to grow so big it can't be killed or stopped, like the IRS/Fed.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R0oekP6OGbo
The GSA is a living, breathing oxymoron. They try to simplify government purchasing by making 999 rules and hoops to jump through, burning through cash and taking a percentage of every contract put through the organization. It's a giant cancerous scam that was allowed to grow so big it can't be killed or stopped, like the IRS/Fed.
I think you might be confusing the U.S. Digital Service, which started in the executive office of the president and is still there, and 18F, which started in GSA and is still there.
I should have been more exact. The original 18F team was made up largely of former Presidential Innovation Fellows a program created by the EOP. The Presidential Innovation Fellows program predated 18F and was moved under the purview of 18F when it was created. So you are right wasn't part of the EOP but everything else still stands. They were created by the head of the GSA, a political appointee and a program created by the EOP was reorganized into them at their creation.
Reminds me a bit of this earlier piece on Lawfare: https://www.lawfareblog.com/your-city-or-your-soul-moral-com...
I don't mean to imply that the actions of the Trump administration are healthy or appropriate. But having just read "Dereliction of Duty" [1] about the Kennedy and Johnson administration and how the Vietnam War was managed in its early days, I think it's clear that the kind of behavior here, especially around valuing personal loyalty over competence or being given accurate information is not a new phenomenon.
The fallout of Watergate, especially the fact that the executive no longer routinely records conversations, mean that we'll never have a good idea of normal/not-normal in this context ever again the way that we have it for the Kennedy and Johnson administrations. So I can't say whether subsequent presidents have made similar decisions, but the "personal loyalty" thing is very definitely not a new thing.
Note that this isolation from reality had large-scale disastrous consequences at that time, so this is not to say that we should become complacent about it. But in itself, I'm finding the "not normal" critique to be a bit shallow; a sort of tu quoque that substitutes for actually criticizing the concrete actions of the administration.
[1] https://www.amazon.com/dp/B004HW7834 -- written by H. R. McMaster, our current National Security Adviser, who I sincerely hope will hold to the standards that he advocates in that volume.
The fallout of Watergate, especially the fact that the executive no longer routinely records conversations, mean that we'll never have a good idea of normal/not-normal in this context ever again the way that we have it for the Kennedy and Johnson administrations. So I can't say whether subsequent presidents have made similar decisions, but the "personal loyalty" thing is very definitely not a new thing.
Note that this isolation from reality had large-scale disastrous consequences at that time, so this is not to say that we should become complacent about it. But in itself, I'm finding the "not normal" critique to be a bit shallow; a sort of tu quoque that substitutes for actually criticizing the concrete actions of the administration.
[1] https://www.amazon.com/dp/B004HW7834 -- written by H. R. McMaster, our current National Security Adviser, who I sincerely hope will hold to the standards that he advocates in that volume.
The "norm" then was to crack down on the wrong when it came to light. Watergate's actions were done in secret and the heroes of the story were journalists investigating the wrongs and trying to correct them.
Just because the past wasn't perfect doesn't mean we shouldn't stop striving for perfection. Watergate having happened doesn't give the administration a blank check to carry out Watergate-level actions in public and treat them as if they were normal and as if they were right.
Just because the past wasn't perfect doesn't mean we shouldn't stop striving for perfection. Watergate having happened doesn't give the administration a blank check to carry out Watergate-level actions in public and treat them as if they were normal and as if they were right.
Watergate was under Nixon, not Johnson or Kennedy -- I was merely pointing out that the side effect of Watergate was that presidents no longer recorded their conversations. This prevents us, for the sake of determining what is "normal", from having a record of what was actually being said by the president and his advisors while these terrible decisions were being made.
Watergate was a criminal act. The acts of Kennedy and Johnson were not criminal, just irresponsible. In particular, cronyism and requiring personal loyalty are not "not normal" as alleged, and the "not normal" argument in general wears a bit thin and lacks any historical perspective.
Watergate was a criminal act. The acts of Kennedy and Johnson were not criminal, just irresponsible. In particular, cronyism and requiring personal loyalty are not "not normal" as alleged, and the "not normal" argument in general wears a bit thin and lacks any historical perspective.
The article here points out that yes, the "normal" in US politics has since about the founding of the country been that the only fealty oath used by the federal government was one to the Constitution and the People. Cronyism and personal loyalty were not criminal, but were considered unethical and when such things come to light, it was the job of a free press and other parts of the government to fix them and make things better. It was never openly "normal" in any school of American government history to accept cronyism or personal loyalty. Sure it happened, but the goal was to reduce and/or eliminate it; that was the presumed "norm".
In addition to the obvious political angle, it's nice to see an engineer talking about their duty to the populace. Software engineers hand waive this off because we generally aren't building things that can kill people. We are however building things that have tremendous impact on people's lives, and many in our profession do not seem to take that seriously.
Important reading. More people are going to have to make hard choices like this as the months unfold, I'd imagine.
[deleted]
Here is the part that's news: "18F (and the larger service we created for it and its sibling organizations, the Technology Transformation Service), is being reorganized via administrative order into the General Services Administration’s (GSA) Federal Acquisition Service. [...]
"We were subsequently told that the new Commissioner of the Federal Acquisition Service would [...] immediately become a political position, with a person appointed directly by the White House."
(The rest is standard anti-Trump rhetoric.)
"We were subsequently told that the new Commissioner of the Federal Acquisition Service would [...] immediately become a political position, with a person appointed directly by the White House."
(The rest is standard anti-Trump rhetoric.)
> (The rest is standard anti-Trump rhetoric.)
Everybody's saying it so it must be unimportant! It's not new so who cares!
Everybody's saying it so it must be unimportant! It's not new so who cares!
Sounds like it was time for the author to move on and I wish him well, but his impact was highest inside the tent. With patience, flexibility and choosing his battles wisely he might have had some influence within his sphere of responsibilities.
The author conflates norms for appearances. For good or bad Trump largely dispenses with appearances and practices his political maneuverings in the open, appearances be damned. But the practices are the same either way.
I've interviewed for an executive branch position where having voted years prior for the opposite party disqualified me. I've worked in a state campaign where my relatives, having donated to the opposite party, placed me under suspicion. Patronage and loyalty testing are the OLDEST of political practices. None of this is new under Trump, and none of it ever changes except in times of indisputable and existential national crisis.
Existential crisis is pretty much upon us. Much blame is deserved across the political spectrum for how we've arrived here.