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Burrowing Into Strawmen

By W. James Antle, III on 1.18.09 @ 2:48PM

According to Matthew Yglesias, "W. James Antle III writes that we shouldn't care about the integrity of the civil service." That would indeed be a stupid thing to write. Except I did not write or say any such thing. I don't agree with burrowing (shifting political appointees into career government positions before leaving office), but it is a bipartisan practice and I see no evidence that President Bush has engaged in it to a greater degree than previous administrations, much less to the point where it will be a serious impediment to Barack Obama's administration. If somebody can give me such evidence, I'll agree that Bush-burrowing is a bad thing because elections have consequences.

Some of Yglesias's commenters are skeptical of my claim that federal civil service employees tilt heavily Democratic, which I argue would at least somewhat mitigate the impact of any Republican burrowing. Hatch Act constraints make this more difficult to quantify than in other lines of work, but I'd point out that the federal employees unions are overwhelmingly Democratic in their campaign giving. It could be that the union leadership is more Democratic than the rank-and-file and thus spends money disproportionately on one political party, but that never happens, right?

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Jeremiah| 1.18.09 @ 3:18PM

Part of the problem may be the conservative / liberal divide is manifestly related to people's occupational identity.

People in management and many blue collar workers "identify" themselves along conservative lines.

People in the so-called "knowledge professions" (teachers, lawyers, doctors, engineers, scholars, journalists, etc.) "identify" themselves as more progressive or "liberal." Thus government agencies face a pool of competent applicants who have already assumed a more Democratic-leaning identity. It's no accident that professionals who are competent enough to work at -- say -- the Justice Department (when a coed isn't screening them based on laughably absurd ideological criteria) are "liberal," and it's not as though there's any conspiracy to keep conservatives out.

Conservatives by and large tend towards profit-making professions or jobs that are blue-collar.

Mitch Berg| 1.18.09 @ 4:42PM

Jeremiah,

Not a bad point - although I believe engineers actually break a bit to the right, overall.

Jeremiah| 1.18.09 @ 6:38PM

Mitch --

Actually, after I'd written my post, I had that same thought. I think I meant to say "scientists."

Engineers are "bottom line" types, I suppose, although I think architects are not.

This is all of course crazy generalizing: there are teachers who are conservative, money market managers who are liberal, and engineers who couldn't care less.

I also was worried that somehow using that formula "knowledge professions" might imply conservatives don't have knowledge. This is not true, of course.

Patscholar| 1.18.09 @ 11:19PM

Actually, Jeremiah, you don't know anywhere near as much about knowledge professions as you think you do. Only a tiny minority of physicians are Marxists or liberals, only a tiny minority of scientists are Marxists or liberals and in both instances those who are were born red diaper babies and have never known anything but poisoned milk. Most teachers are communists, both at the K-12 level and the university level in the arts, history, humanities, but not economics, the sciences, trades, or vocations, business, geography. It is almost impossible for a conservative to get a job in any of our government bureaucracies - I thought everyone knew the State Department, CIA, Defense, Homeland Security, Education, EPA, on and on and on and on and on and on and on, every government bureacracy is a den of Marxists and they only hire Marxists. Bush was unable to get any but a tiny percentage of conservatives appointed to any of them and he was, after all, the elected President. On the other hand, Obama will now replace all socialists with Islamfascists and communists. He is doing it already.

John| 1.19.09 @ 9:22AM

Okay I'll stipulate to the phenomenon. It is an easy task, since I have spent the last 25 years of my professional life watching it occur at a regular pace. Government agencies are generally well salted with Statists/Democrats. Conservatives tend to think that working as a clone of the state for what used to be a modest but reliable stipend is a no go.

Well, two GS13's pull in nice money. They live in a nice, upscale neighborhood, and send their kids to private schools. They don't get fired. They get a massive benefit package of guaranteed pension savings, education grants, generous vacation time, and a host of other "pirques".

The unfortunate part of the "independence" of the civil service is that it is hardly so. The unintended consequence of trying to cure patronage (in the 1880's) was to disconnect the civil service from the actual management authority of the elected executive.

The final straw was the insanity of the establishment of government unions. There was no other reason for such a move than to get around the restrictions of the Hatch Act.

Now, and every level, government employees have formed a non-Constitutional and very powerful fourth branch of the government; The Permanent Bureaucracy.

The effect over the last 60 years or so has been to slowly, brick by brick, court decision by court decision, transfer job by transfer job... into an unaccountable leviathan.

Not what the founders intended... I can guarantee.

r/John

John| 1.19.09 @ 9:23AM

The final straw was the insanity of the establishment of government unions. There was no other reason for such a move than to get around the restrictions of the Hatch Act.

Now, and every level, government employees have formed a non-Constitutional and very powerful fourth branch of the government; The Permanent Bureaucracy.

The effect over the last 60 years or so has been to slowly, brick by brick, court decision by court decision, transfer job by transfer job... into an unaccountable leviathan.

Not what the founders intended... I can guarantee.

r/John

John| 1.19.09 @ 9:36AM

The final straw was the insanity of the establishment of government unions. There was no other reason for such a move than to get around the restrictions of the Hatch Act.

Now, and every level, government employees have formed a non-Constitutional and very powerful fourth branch of the government; The Permanent Bureaucracy.

The effect over the last 60 years or so has been to slowly, brick by brick, court decision by court decision, transfer job by transfer job... into an unaccountable leviathan.

Not what the founders intended... I can guarantee.

r/John

John| 1.19.09 @ 9:49AM

The final straw was the insanity of the establishment of government unions. There was no other reason for such a move than to get around the restrictions of the Hatch Act.

Now, and every level, government employees have formed a non-Constitutional and very powerful fourth branch of the government; The Permanent Bureaucracy.

The effect over the last 60 years or so has been to slowly, brick by brick, court decision by court decision, transfer job by transfer job... into an unaccountable leviathan.

Not what the founders intended... I can guarantee.

r/John