What I Think About What Other People Say (WITAWOPS)

I mourn USAID the way we knew it. The agency that I worked for a decade has essentially disappeared, with only a fraction of it reincarnated and subsumed into the State Department. I empathize with all my former USAID colleagues, contractors, grantees, sub-grantees, recipients, project beneficiaries, vendors, and suppliers in the United States and around the world. All of you are economically and emotionally harmed. The battle will ensue in the Courts and in the end, Congress will have no choice but to act (see my January 4 post explaining this locus of power). The next incarnation of US Foreign Assistance will be skinny, laser-focused, more intertwined with U.S. Peace and Security, and obviously A.I.-driven. Disclaimer: the views expressed in this post are solely my own, published under my first amendment rights, and do not necessarily reflect the views of the United States Government or any of its current or former federal agencies. What Other People Say Designed by  Freepik “Aft...

There is heightened interest in the inefficiencies of the executive branch of the federal government. Today, I unravel some of these inefficiencies using a recent fish farm example.  U.S. Court of Appeals , 5th Circuit, 2020 : “Harvesting,”  we  are  told,  implies  gathering  crops,  and  in  aquaculture  the  fish  are  the  crop.  That  is  a  slippery  basis  for  empowering  an  agency  to  create  an  entire  industry  the  statute does not even mention. We will not bite”    Natural predator guards a tilapia fish farm in Lake Victoria, Uganda The Problem There is heightened interest in the inefficiencies of the executive branch of the federal government. All organizations—whether private, governmental, or non-profit—must engage in continuous optimization to stay effective. They may achieve this through internal reforms...

  “You should not surrender your honest convictions about the value or significance of evidence solely because of the opinions of your fellow jurors. Nor should you change your mind just for the purpose of obtaining enough votes for a verdict…As jurors, you are officers of this court. You must not let your emotions overcome your rational thought process. You must reach your decision based on the facts provided to you and on the law given to you, not on sympathy, prejudice, or personal preference.” -- Instructions to King County jurors in a civil case, 2020. What do I think On the surface, the American jury seems, frankly, absurd. Why should a random group of citizens—without specialized knowledge of law or the specific field at hand—be tasked with deciding someone’s fate in a court of law? What could a jury of laypeople know about the nuances of the legal system and the technicalities of cases involving medicine, education, environmental policy, or other complex areas? How can they...

29% of voters opposed “removing historical racial references, such as “negroes,” “mulattoes” and “whites," from the Oregon Constitution." ( Oregon Measure 14 ). What do I think When I first read this, two thoughts crossed my mind. First, I assumed that the proposed amendment vote happened a very long time ago. Second, why on earth would 29% of voters oppose the motion? I dug into it. It turns out that Oregon's racial history is not rosy. “Oregon began as a whites-only state, through a series of Black exclusionary laws that were designed to discourage Black Americans from living here in the first place.” ( Tiffany Camhi, OPB , October 20, 2024). I wonder: did that culture and history influenced those that voted "no"? But I was also very wrong on the timeframe. It did not take place in the 20th Century. Or the 19th. Measure 14 was actually voted on in this century, in 2002. And yes, 29% of voters opposed it.   I never imagined I could find something more insane....