Sounds reasonable. I don't know about US politics, but in the UK the civil service is (meant to be) independent of party politics and civil servants are meant to impartial and work with whoever the government happens to be (indeed, it's even a half-joke that the civil service actually controls the politicians who are merely public figureheads).
Why I’m staying at 18F
21–30 of 54 posts
Re: Why I’m staying at 18F
#22the title threw me off. I thought it was going to be about someone saying they would not change their a/s/l on chat.
Re: Why I’m staying at 18F
#23I'm not sure how far that can hold. That works if you believe that the government, regardless of which politicians are in power, is doing good work in good faith. I might think that (for instance) universal healthcare is more important than airport security and we'd be fine with pre-9/11 airport security standards, but given that that's not happening, I still support making airport security more effective and more painless.
But if you fundamentally disagree about whether the government should do a thing—like, say, whether we should move towards amnesty or deportation for people who have illegally immigrated here—it doesn't follow that you should say "Fine, if we're deporting people, at least we should deport them well." Or if you think it's immoral for government to fund abortions, you wouldn't conclude "Well okay, at least we should do a top-notch job of funding abortions." Would it not be better for government to do its job poorly?
18F in particular seems like it is prone to the same danger always present in private-sector tech: technology helps social changes happen faster and more effectively, but it has nothing to say about whether the social changes are good or not. Technology enables us everything from unbreakable encryption to trivial government surveillance; it has no opinion on whether unbreakable encryption or trivial government surveillance should exist. If you're worried about that, you either need to move out of pure technology development, or you need to impede the production of dangerous technology (which is guaranteed to be a losing battle).
Re: Why I’m staying at 18F
#24Re: Why I’m staying at 18F
#25> Politicians may (and will) disagree passionately on what government should do. But they all say that for whatever the government does, we should do it well. I'm not sure how far that can hold. That works if you believe that the government, regardless of which politicians are in power, is doing good work in good faith. I might think that (for instance) universal healthcare is more important than airport security and…
Not necessarily. You aren't always trying to stop a particular tech development, just slow it enough to make sure that defending remains easier/cheaper than attacking (in some ways, this is the underlying dynamic of civilization), even though the targets are always moving.
Re: Why I’m staying at 18F
#26Re: Why I’m staying at 18F
#27Earlier quoted context omitted.
Do the agencies themselves realize the subtle benefits of UI/UX changes to websites, TLS, etc? I don't know exactly what all 18F does but it seems like those are among the features I see changing (and appreciate).
Certainly line offices do, although in my experience HQ is in the process of transitioning away from the mindset that IT means MS Word installs and security management. I've been watching a transition from line office hosted CMS to an HQ hosted CMS and it has been informative how off the mark their assessment of what the agency actually does has been.
Re: Why I’m staying at 18F
#28Re: Why I’m staying at 18F
#29The real question is whether the incoming administration wants the government to work well. That's what 18F is about. There are many Republicans in Congress who don't want Government services to work effectively. Mr. Trump, though, may not think that way. He does like to fire people who underperform.
Re: Why I’m staying at 18F
#30This is the optimistic view. But it isn't difficult to imagine a Republican congress drastically cutting the funding available to teams like 18F. Of course, time will tell, and I agree that it's too early to judge yet.
I would be surprised if Republicans tried to balance the budget. Contrary to popular belief and their own rhetoric, Republicans too are not too keen on balanced budget just like Democrats.
You say it as if "both sides do it." No, recent history puts it worse. No sitting Republican president has had a balanced budget since Eisenhower. They are demonstrably worse.