The oil spilling into the Gulf of Mexico is a tough enough problem that when one solution is found, you’d think it would be exploited to its fullest potential, right? Wrong. For example, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal had a working solution on Tuesday, namely 16 oil sucking barges that were collecting oil near his state’s shoreline. Yesterday, Jindal found the barges sitting idle because the Coast Guard ordered the barges to stop operating. Why? For a stupid bureaucratic reason, of course. The Coast Guard had to confirm that each barge had fire extinguishers and life vests and until they got that confirmation they ordered the barges to stop.
This is just a small example of why government is not well-equipped to deal well with all situations. It is neither dynamic enough, flexible enough, nor efficient enough to quickly make decisions and implement them. Indeed, as this clean-up effort shows, the federal government has got too many cooks — or agencies — in the kitchen and the result is a poorly organized and even more poorly executed effort.