Turns out Fleischer saw a story in the Washington Post suggesting that anyone who revealed Valerie Plame's identity might be subject to the death penalty. And he freaked.Unfortunately, Swopa at the Needlenose blog thinks this might not be quite right, but it's still hilarious, in a "these bastards risked our national security to get revenge on one of the few honest people we had in government and his wife, who was helping to fight arms proliferation until said bastards outed her to the world, and ain't comeuppance quite the raging bitch" kind of way.
Fleischer's plight reminds me of another of life's great mysteries, or at least mysteries to me. Why would anyone want a job where they are basically an extremely prominent peon, a familiar face to millions at a job utterly devoid of actual power to do anything at all? When your superiors ask you to bend rules, the result is almost inevitably a felony, and those same superiors will make sure that when certain excremental products hit the fan, you are the one covered head to toe while they come out smelling like a rose (at least if someone other than Patrick Fitzgerald investigates the case). Why would anyone want a job like this? Sure, ambition can drive people up the job ladder, and the Peter Principle guarantees that everyone rises to the level of their own incompetence, as this administration has proven hundreds, if not thousands, of times. Still, who grows up wishing that they might someday become a felonious peon standing near the centers of actual power without ever being delegated any for themselves? It's not a problem unique to government, of course, as any number of corporate executives have proven over the years.
I blame the morality of large enterprises. Neither the government nor large businesses act in a way that individuals would consider "moral". It's not their job to do so, but we seem to pretend frequently that they will anyway. People are loyal to their employer, even though their employer will fire them the second that they no longer contribute sufficiently to make the shareholders and CFO happy. People are loyal to an administration, even though it's policies will generally fall vastly short of their lofty rhetoric and they will be expected as part of their daily duties to cover this fact up. Frankly, blind loyalty to inanimate entities makes idiots of us all, and what's worse, turns people who would otherwise be relatively harmless putzes into virulent schmucks. And in the end, for what? I know people can justify it, but I simply don't get it. What exactly is it that people need, anyway? Once you've got a significant other, family, and friends with whom to spend your time, a good personal library, a kickass TV with a 5+1 surround sound audio system, high speed internet, and enough cash to afford frequent seafood, periodic entertainment events (sports, theatre, movies, dancing, etc...), and the occasional trip somewhere exotic, what more could a person seriously ask for? I'm not even joking here. If you can get all those things by working no more than 10-11 hours a day, then what exactly is the point of all the extra time (for those who can pull it off in 8/day, my hat is off to you, unless you happened to inherit it...)? I just don't understand ambition.
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3 comments:
I can see I'll be waiting a long while for you to become rich and famous. :)
Actually I totally agree. I am ambitious only to the sense I don't want to hate those 8-10 hours a day that I earn my bread.
Well... I sort of agree with you, but that last paragraph sounds like an ode to suburban middle-class mediocrity. I mean, I've been trying to construct my life around the premise there is more to life than eating cheez doodles on the couch with the wife & kids.
I'm not sure there's anything wrong with ambition per se. I think one can be ambitious in a positive direction -- a tireless crusader for human rights, or something. The problem is being power-hungry, wanting to be close to power and influence for its own sake and no other.
If I didn't require 9 hours of sleep a day to feel normal, I might have some ambition myself. I think you need to be one of those people who only needs 4.5 hours a night in order to get into the halls of power.
Hi Alexis, I realize I should have included a job that makes one happy on the list of items that should be sought out. I didn't go into physics because it was a way to pay the mortgage, I chose it because I liked it.
Megan, your complaint is certainly correct, but I'll maintain my statement still applies when restricted to time spent working for a non-moral entity. If someone wants to do more good, through either their job if it involves some kind of moral purpose or volunteerism outside of work, I have no complaint. Even still, though, the goal should be to do as much good as possible, not to attain as much power. My wife can tell stories of people who got involved in the non-profit sector to make a difference, but end up just as power-hungry as a corporate executive after a couple of decades. In the end, the goal has to be to do good, not to be big. Power is useful up to the point of allowing for one to have the means to support a life of middle class meidocrity if one chooses, but beyond that not so much. Making the most out of life is almost an orthogonal question.
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