Move Washington Out of Washington
American Greatness,
by
Roger Kimball
Original Article
Posted By: M2,
11/10/2019 6:43:23 AM
What do you suppose the Alliance for American Advertising has in common with the American Association of Nurse Anesthetists, the American Society of Civil Engineers, or American Apparel and Footwear? Apart from beginning with the letter “A,” they are among the nearly 3,500 trades or firms that have dedicated lobbying operations in Washington, D.C.
And that doesn’t count the union headquarters located in D.C., from AFSCME (“We make America Happen”) to SEIU (“the nation’s most diverse union”) and beyond, they’re all there, hands out, telephones working overtime to get a little bigger slice of the government pie, made with 100 percent locally sourced materials, namely your tax dollars.
Reply 1 - Posted by:
mobyclik 11/10/2019 7:26:46 AM (No. 231269)
Couldn't agree more, spread dozens of those Departments of This and That across the fruited plain too. Let the beaurocrats whine and complain, who cares.
10 people like this.
Reply 2 - Posted by:
former lurker 11/10/2019 7:41:42 AM (No. 231280)
One of the reasons we moved out of DC was the obviousness of the rampant corruption by government employees. It seemed as though every restaurant and hotel in the city was hosting meetings of government employees. Lavish spreads for morning and afternoon breaks. Lovely luncheons and excellent dinners that included wine. These were for people who worked and lived in DC, heaven only knows what they paid for people who joined them from out of town or the expert speakers invited. If we can’t cut the budget of all these department let’s at least spread the gravey around the country.
12 people like this.
Reply 3 - Posted by:
RuckusTom 11/10/2019 7:48:26 AM (No. 231284)
Move everything every 4 or 8 years to the state the elected president claimed residency from. E.g. Clinton - Arkansas; Bush II - Texas; Obama - Illinois; Trump - New York. The disruption factor alone would discourage a lot of bureaucrats from ever having a 20 or 30 or 40 year "career" in the government. People in the military have to do it, why not the bureaucrats? Term limits for the house and the senate and repeal of the 17th Amendment wouldn't hurt either.
14 people like this.
Reply 4 - Posted by:
Paperpuncher 11/10/2019 8:17:02 AM (No. 231325)
Split them up and send them all over the place. Make them live among us deplorables. Agree, we need to get rid of the DOE and many others all together. Huge expense and no results except bad results.
My only concern is we may mess up the electoral college by moving a bunch of left wingers into Red States and changing the makeup of the electorate.
10 people like this.
Reply 5 - Posted by:
franq 11/10/2019 8:23:01 AM (No. 231334)
Split them up? Abolish them!
7 people like this.
Reply 6 - Posted by:
doctorfixit 11/10/2019 8:41:20 AM (No. 231351)
After cutting off all the money, , bulldoze Washington and restore it to swampland.
5 people like this.
Reply 7 - Posted by:
Pearson365 11/10/2019 9:18:09 AM (No. 231400)
The 3500 trade associations and lobbying firms aren’t in DC just to get a bigger “slice of the government pie”. Most of these representatives are there to protect the piece of the pie they have from being gobbled up by the feds through regulations and taxation. If the federal government didn’t have such enormous powers over us, the need for lobbyists would be greatly diminished.
Rather than spending billions moving federal employees out of DC, would be far better to reduce the invasive role of these bureaucrats. Why are the feds involved with regulating the amount of water a dishwasher uses? Why are the feds setting gasoline mileage standards that are designed to force us into micro cars and eventually bicycles? Why are the feds allowed to run the Social Security Ponzi scheme? Could go on and on, but it’s the sheer size of the federal bureaucracy that is the problem, not the location of their massive offices.
7 people like this.
Reply 8 - Posted by:
GO3 11/10/2019 1:30:11 PM (No. 231599)
My pet peeve is the Pentagon. It's an outmoded relic constructed to house a defense establishment when it took 10 people to write, type, encrypt, and sent a message to Eisenhower, MacArthur, Nimitz, etc. Since the late 80s the flags have pushed digitized systems (some good, some bad) video teleconferencing, etc., but still maintain the huge five-sided puzzle palace and thousands of people. Lead by example I say, move assets and people to the field forces, maintain a secure command center and efficient comms and support establishment and there you go. Maybe the building can be used for military housing with some remodeling.
2 people like this.
Reply 9 - Posted by:
NorthernDog 11/10/2019 1:35:00 PM (No. 231603)
Too bad D.C. gave a chunk of land back to Virginia. That area is now infested with government-loving liberals who distort Virginia politics.
3 people like this.
Reply 10 - Posted by:
Rumblehog 11/10/2019 2:15:21 PM (No. 231621)
Make Washington D.C. Poor Again - MWDCPA
Make D.C. Real Estate Affordable Again - MDCREAA
Make D.C. Real Again - MDCRA
....
2 people like this.
Reply 11 - Posted by:
MNluxiegal 11/10/2019 2:31:24 PM (No. 231634)
I am all for relocating the bureaucracies to other parts of the USA. I also have felt for a long time that the capitol ought to be more centralized - perhaps in St. Louis or Kansas City. It would be force the congress critters to live among the 'normals'. They might not be so apt to refer to everything between NYC/DC and LA as 'fly-over country'.
2 people like this.
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Drain it.