The Invisible Foot Strikes Again

Mark Kleiman provides a comprehensive breakdown of the issues raised by the OMB's threat to give the DEA only a small budget increase because of its gross inefficacy. But I prefer Amy’s quick-and-dirty bottom line:

So remember folks, if you're a totally ineffective government agency doing a job that shouldn't be done in the first place, you might only get a small amount of extra money, like say a few million dollars.

And that, of course, is what happens when government works *well*. The usual rule for bureaucracies is the worse you do, the more funding you get.