Fear of Bureaucracy

If you haven't read Jim Barnes' introduction to the new National Journal Decision Makers special issue (reprinted on GovExec.com today as our Management Matters column), do yourself a favor and check it out. It's a great analysis of President Bush's second-term approach to running the executive branch. The first few paragraphs alone are priceless, for their discussion of H.R. Haldeman's 1978 book on Watergate, The Ends of Power. Watergate, Haldeman revealed in the book, went hand in hand with Nixon's effort to reorganize the federal bureaucracy--and, we now know, led to a career federal official, Mark Felt, taking on the role of Deep Throat. "Let's remember the VA," Nixon raged at one point. "Clean those bastards out.... [and] take the Park Service, they've been screwing us for four years."