As a libertarian I’m for shrinking the size of government in general where ever we can. I’m not so hard-line that I think there is no need for ANY public projects or agencies, still stories like this really show me that all of them can stand to have their budget’s slashed so they can behave like any public entity and not spend money like budding rappers in strip clubs.
Story #1:
The National Ocean and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) recently tried to mail a drone from an Air Force base in Florida to one of its own animal sanctuaries in Massachusetts. A fairly simple procedure, you might assume, but also one that involves some pretty clear oversight since the remote-controlled device in question is worth upward of $400,000.
Somehow, one of the boxes of parts was delivered to the wrong address.
“I wasn’t expecting a freaking drone,” explained the lucky guy who received a free Puma All Environment Unmanned Aircraft yesterday along with some weight-lifting equipment he ordered from Amazon. He goes by the alias “Seventy_Seven” on Reddit, and there isn’t much known about him besides the fact he’s a college student nowhere near Massachusetts and has no time for aquatic wildlife monitoring equipment since he’s busy getting ripped on his new bench set.
Now the misstep could be a simple error. I’ve gotten wrong packages from companies that have their affairs in order, and I’ve had items vanish into the aether. Still something tells me, as somebody who used to work closely with NOAA this could very well be rank incompetence.
Story #2.
A senior official at the Environmental Protection Agency’s Office of Inspector General testified Wednesday that a career EPA official stored thousands of pornographic files on his government computer, and has admitted to watching porn a lot while at work, sometimes for most of his day.
“When an OIG special agent arrived at this employee’s work space to conduct an interview, the special agent witnessed the employee actively viewing pornography on his government-issued computer,” Allan Williams, deputy assistant inspector general for Investigations told the House Oversight & Government Reform Committee.
“Subsequently, the employee confessed to spending, on average, between two and six hours per day viewing pornography while at work.”
…Chaffetz asked how long the porn viewing has been going on, and Perciasepe said he didn’t know. Chaffetz indicated his understanding was that it has been happening since 2010, and fired at Perciasepe, “How can I know and you don’t?”
Chaffetz then asked why the official hasn’t been fired. “Fire him! What’s the question?”
Perciasepe said he was waiting for the OIG’s final report on the employee. Chaffetz then asked what Perciasepe is doing about the situation now, to which Perciasepe said he was doing nothing.
Now first I’ll note that agency owned property belongs to the agency, not the employee using it. They can have whatever policy they want about it. If the agency doesn’t have a policy against pornographic images, games, ect, I don’t know if I’d have a cow about that. I assume if he has a laptop it’s because he travels with it, if the company allows him to use it however he wants when he’s off the clock there is no problem.
Still we’re talking about the BULK of his work day is looking at porn!!! First up who does this? I wouldn’t dare GLANCE at porn while one the job, at the root just because while I’m working in my office that’s the LAST thing of interest I’d want to do. Further who the hell needs more than 10-20 minuets of porn time to accomplish the task it’s used for?
Weather he was doing “one small load of laundry by hand” or playing World of Warcraft or Solitare, the times admitted to (and that’s what he’ll admit to), he’s NOT doing whatever the job he’s supposed to do. Either his job is so superfluous that his lack of effort isn’t noticed, or his management is so incompetent they aren’t noticing one of their workers isn’t pulling the wagon.
And they’re doing NOTHING about this? Of course not, it’s not like it’s THEIR money! Hey, they can always ask for more! And with the Church of Global Warming running the government right now, NOAA and the EPA are probably getting blank checks at this time.
Disgusting!
