Thursday, September 10, 2009

The APD, BCSO, and NMSP have a tactical plan for the State Fair.

The APD, BCSO, and NMSP are planning to protect the public (interests) during the State Fair. The expectation is that they will make it impossibly difficult for some hoodlum to roll one of us while we are at the state fair (without getting caught). If a hoodlum is so desperate that they are willing to get caught, there is no protection from them.

I point out that, according to their own admission, a tactical plan exists. Somewhere there exists, a pile of paperwork that represents their plan to protect us. It is a public record; we have a right to see it.

On the other hand, it is a tactical plan and, there is a necessity to keep at least parts of it secret from the hoodlums.

Somewhere in between is a compromise solution. We have the opportunity to critically review the plan, and they get to hide what they need to hide (according to due process) in order for the plan to work.

The same holds true for the tactical plan to protect the public
not at the state fair, but rather in the state government,
when we give over the control over our power and resources,
to politicians and public servants.

Where is that plan?

The most we ever see from politicians is the promise of their
commitment. Not one of them is willing to show us their plan
to end corruption and incompetence in politics and in public
service. So far, two and a half candidates have laid their plan on
the table for critical review. I assign have to the candidate who
has no plan, but is the only one who had promised to tell us
the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, about
his spending of our power and resources and including,
about his public service.

A plan is not rocket science.

The Goal
The goal is;
  • to make it impossibly difficult to hide corruption and incompetence in state government and,
  • to provide inescapable accountability for public servants, even including the most powerful.

The Enabling Objectives
  • Make government completely transparent, and
  • provide for principled resolution of legitimate complaints against politicians and public servants.

The Devil is in the Details

There are some obvious tools; open meetings, robust webcasting, searchable archives, ...

Here is where I get in over my head. In fairness, is in not fair
to expect me to bear the burden of designing the ultimate answer.
There really is no legitimate expectation that I ought to be able
to lay out the administrative apparatus that will offer
transparent accountability to meaningful standards of conduct
and competence, in politics, and in public servants.

There are men an women, who in exchange for a few hundred
thousand dollars, can lay out a pretty reasonable administrative
tactical plan for transparent accountability. It is within their
bailiwick, wikilink; and not mine.

All you have to concede is that it could be done, and that there
are people who can do it, and according to some due process in
which, stakeholders have confidence.

The problem is not that there are no plans.

The problem is that there is no one who will show us their plan,
and then promise that they will execute it, or be destroyed in the trying.

If a candidate has no plan to end the culture of corruption,
how can it be explained except that,
they are not really planning to end it at all?

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