I suppose I consider myself to be someone who still has (what could be a radically misplaced) belief in the need for government. I do believe that government should serve all of the people—those who are capable and productive, and those who may not be so. That’s the purpose of government: to help all the people, not just the so-called “productive” few. Not everyone has the same education or opportunities; governing is supposed to treat all citizens the same and to provide support for everyone: the good, the bad, the rich, the poor, the indigent, the uneducated, etc.

I do believe that a good part of the time that government is not as efficient and effective in doing what it’s supposed to do. I also think that it’s not possible to run a government like a business. Business and the profit motives inherent in capitalism—the basis of the economic engine of America—reward profit-creators. At least that’s what happens in the small business world. The larger the enterprise, the larger the corporation, the more dead weight and non-productive cogs appear in the corporate wheel (as long as the money rolls in, dead weight is tolerated, and paid, sometimes really well).

When you have a government that supposedly serves all of the people—the haves and the have-nots—and an “enterprise” that must abide by certain laws that prevent discriminatory hiring and management practices, then you run into trouble when you try to make a government operate like a business. Government just doesn’t work the way business does. This is a fact.

One thing that I have noticed over my many years in business, as well as the experience I’ve had working with non-profits and government entities, is that the biggest problem for any enterprise is training and hiring new people to be effective. I think this is especially true in government because what happens is that when there is a regime change, a lot of the work and energy and momentum that may have been built up in a previous administration loses steam because there’s a massive turnover in staff and their responsibilities. The new team has its own agenda, and it may ignore the previous work that’s already been done.

Now this sounds like a crazy management rant, but for a current political regime not to have (or be loath to use) the knowledge and programs created by the previous governors (assuming they are effective), creates massive problems. The same dumb mistakes are going to happen again and again, particularly when the new regime has no institutional memory of what’s gone on in the past. History informs the present, and the future. If it’s ignored by always trying to recreate a new wheel, well, we will all suffer, and it’s not gonna get done.

I’ve seen this time and time again. It’s very frustrating to deal with.

I’m not saying that that educating politicians is an easy process. It may be a function of the way our political system is set up, and it may also be the fact the new people want to do things their own way without being burdened by the old ways of doing things.

There’ s something to be said for trying new methods, but before you do that, you’d better be damned sure that you understand and appreciate the old methods. Then you can improve upon them.

It could also be that there’s sort of a generational inequality in valuing the historical nature of any process. But I think that there needs to be someone in any regime that understands and has been around long enough to understand what’s happened in the past; to know the players; the history of the process; what’s gone wrong and what’s gone right. To ignore this is to create a ridiculously long learning curve for a new generation.

Maybe every time a new politician gets into office, they should be forced to keep a savvy consultant who really knows the ropes to brief them on history. I’m sure this happens in management, but I don’t know if it happens when there’s a potentially great concept that’s been bounced around but has never come to fruition. And of course, I’m assuming that this consultant would be doing his or her job with an altruistic motivation.

I’ve seen this again and again with the concept of creating a music museum in New Orleans. That’s probably why it’s still a dream and not a reality.