Should your taxes pay to fetch dry cleaning, walk dogs, and make private dinner reservations for government officials? Or do our public servants live in their own Republic of royalty, with underlings whose “other duties as assigned” make them personal errand boys?
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14 replies on “Republic of Royalty: Your Taxes Fund Errand Boys for Government Officials”
Seems this has been going on for quite some time now. Old George Washington asked for an expense account, though he initially didn’t want a salary. Check out this explanation: https://www.plaintruth.com/the_plain_truth/2011/09/george-washingtons-expense-account.html
This is what happens when people are using other people’s money.
I fully agree with Bill W. that executives may need their paid personal assistants to do personal duties to allow him to fulfill his mission as Sec of State.
But, the general answer that I believe is required here is that if someone was using their own money, they are more responsible. Directly paying someone for a service using your own money makes you use your own judgement as to value and quality. Using someone else to use your money to buy something takes the assessment of quality and value down a notch.
And then there is government. Using someone to buy something with someone else’s money leads to orders of magnitude loss of quality, value, and escalates cost.
It occurs to me that if Pompeo is out walking his dog, picking up his dry-cleaning, going to the post office for stamps or to mail a package, etc. there would have to be a Secret Service detail surrounding him also. So you not only are losing his time devoted to the main task to which he has been appointed but also 3-6 other guys.
The people at Pompeo’s level can afford to pay the dry cleaner to pick up and drop off their clothing. They should look for options for similar tasks. How long does it take to make dinner reservations? Can’t their spouse do it? If this is unreasonable, then Congress should put funds for this in the budget so that the selective outrage machine is not fed.
I agree with much of what Bill says and much of what the other commenters have expressed, but I would be very, very, very surprised to learn that Truman didn’t have at least one valet and other personal staff. Also Truman’s secretary of state. Truman’s staff probably didn’t fetch much dry cleaning because he had an entire laundry service to take care of the nautral fibers which made up his wardrobe that required much more careful handling than a washer and dryer. Hand washing, ironing, brushing, polishing, mending, etc., etc. Real wardrobe maintenance for a prominent person is indeed a full-time job, even today. The White House has not only laundry (presumably now including dry cleaning) facilities, but also has a salon, hair and makeup experts, and other personal services that most people don’t have in their homes.
I think we can all agree that the President and First Lady must have such personal staff. We can also agree that 28 people for Mrs. Obama is a bit on the extravagant side.
If Cabinet members don’t have such designated assistants, I agree with Bill that they ought to. I would be pretty surprised if they don’t already have them, though.
In Congress, it’s probably mostly interns who fetch the dry cleaning and the coffee, but I would expect that most people have at least one taxpayer-funded personal assistant, more for higher-ranking members, and that’s fine with me too.
In the military, I believe (correct me if I’m wrong) high-ranking officers have a steward and/or other personal assistants who aren’t privately funded but are themselves active duty servicemen. This is an ancient tradition and it’s still an important role today.
I think the only dispute anyone would have is “how many” and “how far down the ladder.” Witty Fool suggests a fixed number, any more having to be paid for by the campaign or otherwise funded privately. That might be reasonable, but legislation and regulation seem overkill to me. I would rather see, for example, the political parties include as part of their platforms, candidates pledging to follow their rules, than for my senator to have to spend time legislating something like that.
I think the only reason that anyone would write an article complaining about such a “problem” is that we plebes find something distasteful about anyone’s being a “servant.” We associate such a word with aristocrats and even slave owners and tend to assume that any person serving another is by definition being exploited and humiliated, and that the person being served ought to get up off their butt and do it themselves. Such self-reliance is part of the American DNA.
But a servant is not necessarily an exploited person. On the contrary, when done willingly, serving others is a noble and high calling. We say that people “serve” in the military. We use the term in religious contexts within our families, our parishes, and going out to others in the wider world. Politicians like to call themselves “public servants” to aggrandize such nobility to themselves. But I’ve noticed that many “do-gooders,” especially on the left, prefer the term “help.” They want to “help” those who are not as “fortunate” as themselves, not “serve” them. “Helping” does not carry any connotation of humility; “serving” does, and our pop culture recoils from that.
I think, moreover, that any idea that there’s anything immoral or abusive about a president or a secretary of state having personal servants is a comparatively new idea. Even the founding fathers had personal servants (and called them servants). I don’t know if it can be traced back to Marx, but certainly in the last 60 years or so our culture has become more egalitarian-focused instead of opportunity-focused. As conservatives, we know in our bones that this shift is damaging, but we don’t express or address it very well. But I think it is at the heart of the culture war.
Anyone receiving a paycheck from the public is NOT a “Public Servant”. They are an employee. If they are elected but draw a paycheck, they are an employee, not a “servant”. If they require other employees to facilitate their continuation in office, they may need an assistant or two, which might accompany the salary of the elected. More than a fixed, specific, and minimum number of assistants should be funded by the employee and those salaries may need to be funded by the campaign. Why isn’t there a list of “interns” or volunteers to fill these positions just to have an inside view of Congress?
Every senior executive has a gopher or assistant to this type of tasks. In the real world they are paid for by the executive, who generally makes a lot more than the sec state. I would care more about this story if the “reporter” had interviewed former sec states or sec anything from other admins and asked, did you do this. And then exposed it as taxpayer waste when they all said yes.
As Scott said, in The West Wing, the pres had Dule Hill as his body man.
Is it the lighting ? Scott looks like he’s been baked!
He has been baked.
That means something else entirely in Colorado…
Secretarial, Personal, Occupational, Utility Service Expert…Spouse. Like the rest of us.
If these people don’t already have assistants, they should. It would be a lot more efficient than having a bunch of Karen’s (Whistle Blowers) who apparently already don’t have enough to do, running around trying to score a gotcha on either side. Somebody really need to do a study on what these people actually do for the 6 hours a day they spend at work.
Michelle Obama had 28 people on her personal staff!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Talent? Doing the real work of the republic? How many so called public servants actually have the talent, the will, the discipline to do the necessary work of the republic? Rather than just doing the minimum work so their job continues. My answer is I hope they exist but I am waiting to see the evidence that the number is larger than microscopically small.
For the most part, they are pathetic wannabe tyrants, who when granted some kind of power, will rush to misuse it and extend it beyond any reasonable limit. The royal treatment, perks, and kickbacks are at best only anesthetics to hide the fact they know they are a dead weight on the republic rather than an engine powering freedom and liberty. Almost everyone is in the wagon and far too few are pushing it. We the People are to be used and abused as bottomless ATM’s to be discarded when the account is overdrawn.
We could eliminate 80% of the alphabet soup dead weight and the republic would be better off for it!