h a l f b a k e r yStrap *this* to the back of your cat.
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As part of the terms of employment, every Public Servant, from President down to local dog-catcher, has video cameras focused on them 24/7. After all, the Public pays their salaries, so the Public has a Right to Know what they are doing, and whether or not they are actually doing what they are supposed
to be doing (looking out for the interests of the Public, that is).
This may have a side-effect that only porn stars will seek to become Public Servants. So? Who says they can't do a better job than the crowd of bureaucrats already out there?
=========Added March 2
Based on the annotations, I'll make two adjustments to the preceding. Only elected Public Servants get videoed 24/7. All the others would get videoed during working hours only.
I should mention that one of the inspirations for this Idea was the recent flurry of arrests by Police Officers of people making videos of their actions, especially actions that show those Public Servants to be abusing their Authority. The only way to rein them in is for Public Outrage to be raised up--but that can only happen if the Public can find out exactly what those Bad Cops actually did. Which, you see, by trying to arrest people videoing them, and destroying the evidence, the Bad Cops are trying to prevent.
US Bureau of Labor Statistics: Employment by major industry sector
http://www.bls.gov/emp/ep_table_201.htm
[calum, Mar 02 2012]
Office of Government Commerce
http://en.wikipedia...nment_Commerce#Logo
[calum, Mar 02 2012]
Ilona Staller for president
http://nl.wikipedia.../wiki/Ilona_Staller
Pornstar politician [zeno, Mar 02 2012]
quis custodiet
http://brianaldiss....t-on-probability-a/
full employment scheme [mouseposture, Mar 02 2012]
[link]
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I don't think you have quite enough disrespect for public servants. The vast majority of them will chafe at any concept whereby they are required to account for their activities while gorging at the trough. |
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That said, idealism is always nice. |
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EDIT: Should have worded better. Ought to have said, "ELECTED public servants." |
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It won't stop revolving doors, pre-arranged deals, and
hidden information. |
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[-] If you give the government the power and ability to constantly monitor one group of people, who do you think they'll
turn this ability on next? We're headed towards a surveillance society quickly enough as it is. No need to hasten the
process. |
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[ytk], the problem with the oncoming surveillance society is that the Public Servants are attempting to exclude themselves. And as Robert A. Heinlein said, "Secrecy is the beginning of tyranny." So, who should watch the watchers? Everyone! |
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why are public servants capitalised? |
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Sooo... you want to humiliate public servants, take away their privacy and whip up a baying
pitchfork-wielding mob against them, but you'd still like public services? [-] |
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The trouble is that that actually happens, [bigsleep] - for instance, many shop workers are constantly monitored by CCTV. Come to think of it, if they were also part of the Tesco's thing, they'd already have been slaves anyway. |
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//why are public servants capitalised?//
It's a new method of valuing the public sector. Each Public Servant is assigned a value based upon the sum they would collect when sold on the presently still notional National Public Sector Employee Exchange, which will form Vernon's next idea. |
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By the statistics I saw on the internet, US "public sector" employment as a proportion of the overall workforce is about 15-16%. Service sector (including public sector) workers constitute approx. 79% of the workforce. If 79% of the people working in the states are performing some activity for others and if we accept the position that the market does not of itself represent a mechanism to ensure quality and value then doesn't it make sense to expand the Quality Through Constant Surveillance Programme to everyone who doesn't make or farm something? In short - why are you singling out public sector workers? |
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Speaking as a public sector worker, I'm all in favour of this idea. It's a long overdue expansion of the public sector and I look forward eagerly to frittering away even more of your taxes on pointless surveillance activity. |
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This is a great idea. Disincentives for working in public service will certainly keep the best workers out. I suggest they also be forced to wear garish clothing that identifies them as government employees on and off the clock, so people can keep an eye on them. |
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DrBob makes a great point. The surveillance data has to be turned into information, presumably by human review. This review could either (1) be distributed to misanthropic shut ins or to nursing homes (with reviewers given a credit towards care) or (2) fall under the auspices of, I dunno, the Office of Government Commerce (whose logo seems apt, considering the 24/7 level of surveillance proposed). |
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This is tasty pie in the sky, but even politicians at the state
level are privy to official secrets, so the cameras would
have to be turned off sometimes. The President Channel
would be mostly best-of reruns and live footage of naptime
(without sound, in case the President talks in his sleep). |
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Crooked bankers are a bigger drain on society than school teachers, why not stick cameras on them? |
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Yeah, and the lawyers! Oh, and all the Big Oil CEOs! And all
the criminals, too, we should definitely put cameras on
them! |
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Hell, lets aim the cameras at EVERYONE! If you have nothing to hide, you shouldn't have any objections. |
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Round the clock monitoring with CCTV cameras in people's
homes was in fact seriously proposed by the last government
here, which would probably have applied to some of those who
were recently expected to work for nothing, but not for public
sector workers so much as the urban poor. |
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But, as others have pointed out, above, that would
transform the poor into public sector workers <link>. |
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I had a hunch we were groping towards that. Lambda calculus
again. |
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If you really think about it, were all paid to serve
each other. So does that mean we should be
stripped of evert scrap of humanity and dignity
while on the clock? I don't think so.. |
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That said, I realize that workers in some areas of
government are notoriously lazy, but theres got to
be a better way to motivate them. |
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//Round the clock monitoring with CCTV cameras in people's homes was in fact seriously proposed by the last government here// - Really? You're seriously saying that the Government put forward policies that said that everyone should be under surveillance in their homes at all times? I suspect this is just one of those statements with a tiny grain of truth in it but which suggests so much more and allows people who like to hear this sort of scare story to nod their heads wisely and say "ooh yes, the Government is evil...". |
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Government is evil, though perhaps a necessary evil, by it's very nature, but yes, it was proposed and this isn't a Daily Mail lore thing. I'm curious about where you live now. |
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It wasn't everyone at all times. It was to do with the child safety moral panic. |
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