[at-l] REALLY OT - Political.

[stephensadams at hotmail.com (Steve Adams)]

I?m violating a rule of AT-L.

The headline from ?The Washington Post? (7-10-04) is entitled ?Panel 
Condemns Iraq Prewar Intelligence.?  This post rants about the seeming U.S. 
intelligence failure and the ?resulting? miscalculations which led us to 
invade Iraq.  If you will be offended by such an OT post, please delete now.

I have noticed some similarities of large organizations.  The boss doesn?t 
know you.  The boss doesn?t know how good an employee you are.

Bosses easily classify employees as a positive, a neutral, or a negative.  
This isn?t a rigorous process, it?s only an impression.  This impression 
becomes immutable over time, a ?fact.?  If you mildly agree or are 
noncommital, you are a neutral.  If you offer what you consider to be good 
ideas, they may be welcomed and you become recognized, a ?Team Player? (you 
are a positive).  If your ideas are not welcomed, you become suspect, one 
who ?rocks the boat? (you are a negative).  Where advancement is limited - - 
and I can?t think of a place where it isn?t - - it?s given to the positives, 
those employees who please the boss.  Negative employees are doomed to poor 
assignments without advancement.

An analyst providing information supporting what his superiors are looking 
for becomes a ?positive.?  An analyst reporting contradictory data becomes a 
?negative.?  The analysts? supervisor, upon receiving this information, 
confronts the same challenges deciding what to pass along the chain.

We are now, in current parlance, asking people to think outside the box.  
It?s a very small box at the top.  Every person who gained entry to the box 
got in by virtue of his/her ability to think inside-the-box better than 
anyone else.  This required focus; limiting his/her concern to matters 
within the box, and; becoming and remaining a positive.  Anyone who is 
capable to think outside-the-box is gone; they either left the box or were 
pushed out.

Before our invasion of Iraq, our leadership warned all manner of dire 
consequences for inaction.  I knew what this administration was looking for. 
  I knew what it wanted to hear.  I?m not the only one with such ?perfect? 
vision.

Our government investigations ask, ?What went wrong with the intelligence 
community??  This limits the scope of inquiry.  No one is going to answer, 
?The emperor has no clothes.?  That response is not relevant to the inquiry, 
and such a respondent becomes a negative.  The limiting scope of our 
investigations assures the government a pass; it won?t be scrutinized 
closely.  We are in an ?Alice in Wonderland? world.  If we aren?t willing to 
look at our problems fully and honestly, we won?t solve them.

If you intend to reply, please email me direct rather than take up space on 
AT-L.

Thanks.

Steve

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