Offering a new governing vision: replace red tape with individual accountability / Chair: @PhilipKHoward

New York City
Joined December 2008
Interesting that Philip Howard, long an advocate for sensible government procedures, is launching a new book subtitled How Public Employee Unions Make Governing Unmanageable. He's going much farther than the Abundance advocates . . . .
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Common Good retweeted
Artificial intelligence could lock in every inanity of dealing with public rules and procedures. But with a different approach, it may actually help policymakers become more effective, writes Philip K. Howard. thefp.com/p/government-ai-ph…
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Common Good retweeted
Organized Labor and Public Sector Unions Californians hold generally favorable views of unions in the abstract. Nearly half (46%) say unions benefit workers in both the private and public sectors, while only 22% believe that unions generally do more harm than good. Democrats are particularly supportive, with roughly two-thirds expressing a broadly positive view of unions. Voters are less favorable when asked specifically about public-sector unions and their role in government. Nearly half of Californians (48%) believe that public-sector unions have too much influence over elections and government decision-making, compared with just 14% who say they have too little influence. Nearly two-thirds of Californians (63%) also support limiting the power of public-sector unions if doing so would make it easier to reward high-performing employees, discipline poor performers, and deliver better public services at a lower cost. Notably, majorities of independents (62%), Democrats (53%), Raman supporters (59%), and Bass supporters (52%) are in favor of reforms aimed at limiting public-sector union power and improving accountability and service delivery. Support for organized labor therefore coexists with skepticism about public-sector unions and openness to limits tied to better government performance.
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How do we restore effectiveness, responsibility, and common sense to American governance? Join us next week on Wednesday, October 7 for a public lecture with @PhilipKHoward at @NotreDame: "Responsibility Versus Red Tape." More details here: constudies.nd.edu/events/202…
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Democrats used to be into education reform. Then they got tired of fighting the teachers’ unions. Now they’ve abandoned the field. My latest over at @thestatesforum: statesforum.substack.com/p/d…
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“We’re still trapped in this kind of quicksand of law that we created, where no one can make a judgment.” ~@PhilipKHoward
Twenty-three million Americans work for the government. Collectively, they cost trillions of dollars—yet the system often fails to deliver public services well. @philipkhoward on why we tolerate a government that doesn't work.
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"Washington State had a rule that you could not get licensed as a foster parent if you didn’t recycle. One of the taskforce licensors shared that she had never been able to license a family living on tribal land, because they had no recycling service." eatingpolicy.com/p/how-to-pe…
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"Society might work better if people understood what was expected of them and had room to use their judgment," @PhilipKHoward of @CommonGood writes in the Red Tape newsletter. wapo.st/475T7oE
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The great @PhilipKHoward with some hard truths: "The phobia against human judgment is America’s unspoken taboo. As a result, the American state is floundering....This antihuman governing system helped spawn populism." wapo.st/4htryvv
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“So we have this system that assumes that right and wrong can be proved objectively. That is manifestly false.” ~@PhilipKHoward
Replying to @PhilipKHoward
@PhilipKHoward argues that modern government is built on a false premise: that human judgment can be replaced by rules and proof.
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Glad to be in today's Washington Post with my opinion piece! For the sake our families and our collective mental health, LET KIDS ROAM! wapo.st/4itExi1
“When Karyann Parkinson’s 5-year-old son, Sam, asked if he could walk about a half mile to their neighborhood pond to collect goose feathers, she didn’t have a hard time saying yes,” Lenore Skenazy, the president of @LetGrowOrg and the founder of the @FreeRangeKids movement. “Soon after, three cops, two CPS workers and the security guard were on the scene.” wapo.st/4AnqEIG
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A really interesting piece from my colleague Rachel Canter. She crunched the numbers and found blue states, and states with strong teachers' unions, have been slower to adopt the sorts of literacy reforms that succeeded across the South. However... wsj.com/us-news/education/mi…
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Common Good retweeted
Only one transmission line has won state approval in Oregon or Washington since 1982. It took 17 years, and permitting delays added at least $300 million to the cost, which lands on ratepayers. Faster review doesn't have to mean weaker environmental checks. sightline.org/clear-the-line…
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Replying to @PhilipKHoward
@PhilipKHoward joins us to explain how America replaced human judgment with legal complexity—and what it would take to bring common sense back. New episode of Infinite Loops out now. Timestamps: 0:00 Intro 1:00 Government Without Judgment 14:00 Why Government Burns Money 20:38 150 Million Words 30:20 Principles Over Rulebooks 39:00 America’s Anti-Invention Problem 48:07 AI and Human Accountability 57:42 Philip’s Reform Agenda 1:08:00 A Diversity of Conformities 1:13:36 Two Ideas for Humanity
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“The Constitution, with all amendments, is 7,500 words… The current system of federal law and regulation is 150 million words. It is beyond the capacity of any human understanding.” ~@PhilipKHoward
Replying to @PhilipKHoward
@PhilipKHoward joins us to explain how America replaced human judgment with legal complexity—and what it would take to bring common sense back. New episode of Infinite Loops out now. Timestamps: 0:00 Intro 1:00 Government Without Judgment 14:00 Why Government Burns Money 20:38 150 Million Words 30:20 Principles Over Rulebooks 39:00 America’s Anti-Invention Problem 48:07 AI and Human Accountability 57:42 Philip’s Reform Agenda 1:08:00 A Diversity of Conformities 1:13:36 Two Ideas for Humanity
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Two out of three likely voters say that a government worker should be treated like any other worker -- they should be paid more if they're good, paid less if they're not, and fired if they don't perform.
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