An Urban's Rural View

Government officials who've had their budgets cut sometimes fight back by slashing services the public can't do without. Pick on the firefighters, they calculate, and the public will scream and the politicians will be forced to restore the money.

There is, the Washington Post thinks, a whiff of this "firemen first principle," also called "Washington Monument Syndrome," in how some government agencies are reacting to sequestration (http://tiny.cc/…). A Post editorial lambasts the practice as a "ham-handed tactic," tantamount to "bureaucratic hostage taking."

The White House's announcement that it's eliminating White House tours is the example the Post editorial focuses on. But many cattlemen and some Republican politicians see evidence of Washington Monument Syndrome in USDA's threats to furlough meat inspectors.

Forcing packing plants to close down, lay off workers and drive up meat prices is a good way to get the public's attention, so the pols' suspicions are understandable. USDA, as you might expect, denies it's playing the firemen-first game. Ag secretary Tom Vilsack says the way the sequestration law was written gives the agency no choice. If Congress is unhappy about the result, Congress has the ability to fix the problem.

Now Congress is toying with doing just that. There are a number of proposals to give the administration more flexibility in implementing sequestration. A group of eight Republican senators led by Roy Blunt of Missouri is pushing a plan to forbid furloughs of federal employees, like meat inspectors, who protect the safety of people or property. It allows agencies to move money around to keep those critical people on the job.

If the administration resists being given that kind of flexibility, it will be read as an indication that what's really going on here is what the Post calls "bureaucratic hostage taking."

(ES)

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