In countering governmental spin trying to justify “scandals” and disasters that have befallen citizens, there is a frustrating undertone that defies logic where ultimately NEGATIVE OUTCOMES are recategorized as POSITIVE OUTCOMES. In the case of specific negative outcomes whether it’s the death of a young man, the death of four Americans, or the failures of Obamacare, governmental praise of things that are working hardly satisfies the need for government to respond to its failures.
For instance, most Americans know that from lower premiums for all to keep your plan if you like it to “solving” the 47 million uninsured Obamacare has many failures that are ongoing.
Similarly, most Americans realize that whatever else the Ferguson police do, somehow one police officer killed Michael Brown, an unarmed young man. Whatever American ambassadors succeed at, we also know that four Americans died in Benghazi.
These are NEGATIVE OUTCOMES and arguments that teeter on virtually alleging that these events didn’t happen can only perpetuate mistrust of government and foster citizen dissatisfaction.
In a reasonable world few would argue that there isn’t some failure that occurred with policies and procedures that lead to the death of an unarmed young man, the death of four Americans or the failure of a massive piece of legislation that has worked to citizen detriment time and time again and that at its best and smallest goal of getting Americans some kind of insurance has also failed enrolling only a single-digit number of millions of the 47 million uninsured Obamacare was designed to “get insured.”
Arguing there was no failure in policy or procedure or its implementation would implicitly be an argument that the outcome was desired.
Yet “spinning” reality has become so pathological that we listen to the tales of government justifying NEGATIVE OUTCOMES without an acknowledgment of failure or inadequacy of policies and procedures or their implementation that allowed such negative outcomes.
It’s hard to anticipate how far this governmental spin will go. Defending negative outcomes has become a muddied sump of sorting through and sometimes criticizing the victims, criticizing the critics or, as in the case of Obamacare spinning alleged provisions and results to rename NEGATIVE OUTCOMES as POSTIVE OUTCOMES with the schizophrenic combination of lies and “statistics.”
Naturally, we assume that even the President who perpetrated much of the misinformation about Obamacare must cringe at his list of promised goals of 2008, “…accessible health care for every single American - because you shouldn't have to worry about being one illness away from bankruptcy. If you like the health care you have, you'll see lower premiums under my plan. If you don't have health care, you'll be able to get the same kind of coverage that members of Congress give themselves,” 9/6/2008, Obama's Speech to the AARP Convention, “Saying It Don’t Make It So: Obamacare,”7/7/2014 The Mean-ing of America: If You’ve Given The Voters What they want, Shut Up,” 9/23/2012, http://conoutofconsumer.blogspot.com/search?q=AARP.
So what do Ferguson, Benghazi and Obamacare teach us about OUTCOMES and their relationship to policies and procedures?
It could be that we settle on policies and procedures that include some failure as part of their system. Sometimes policies and procedures allow for the death of an unarmed young man, or the death of Americans, or the failure to insure millions of Americans adequately.
OK, so based on unsuccessful outcomes, finding that usually things work out but sometimes they don’t we choose to essentially ignore the impact on victims of imperfect policy and procedure.
This acceptance of failure some of the time would maintain the status quo but at LEAST would acknowledge that a particular catastrophic result is a shame in a particular instance. We see this when doctors lose patients they expected to save, when juries wrongfully convict individuals of crimes. If doctors begin to lose more and more patients with a given procedure, then theoretically the acceptable levels of failure would be exceeded and the procedure would change.
Sometimes we find that the policies and procedures change in response to failure. This finding acknowledges the failure and commits to the need to modify policies and procedures to reduce the likelihood of a similar failure from occurring again often by providing a temporary fix designed to prevent further negative outcomes while new policies and procedures are put in place. We see this in Ferguson where in November, 2014 the Justice Department issued guidelines for police to maintain public safety and preserve citizen rights.
While this approach does not charge that someone violated existing policies and procedures, it at least represents a learning moment for governments regarding failed OUTCOMES. For instance, Ferguson police could be required by new policies and procedures to be less likely to kill unarmed citizens, Americans abroad could be protected by new policies and procedures to facilitate communication and response to situations that arise, and Obamacare could be re-examined to amend its provisions.
A third possibility is to defend the policies and procedures by arguing that a specific individual or individuals failed to follow that procedure. This would be a case where you would see a named individual taking the fall as the responsible party. While this approach would not change policy and procedure it would get rid of a particular individual blamed for not following such procedure.
But then there’s the new style of defense of the status quo, pretending the outcome was correct. It’s nauseating to listen to government arguments that police followed policy and procedure correctly when the OUTCOME is that an unarmed citizen was killed.
It’s ridiculous to hear that everything went as it should in Benghazi when four Americans died. It’s obscene to discount the financial and physical misery Obamacare policies have on millions of Americans by arguing that it’s “working.”
It is this defense of negative outcome by saying policies and procedures were followed correctly and that those policies and procedures are working that leads to the most citizen frustration. Something isn’t working when we experience negative outcomes. To redefine negative outcomes as positive outcomes is not only frustrating for citizens but erodes confidence in our public entities.
In no world is Obamacare “working.” It’s had provisions changed by courts, by administrators, by the IRS all to keep it going. It’s left tens of millions uninsured, underinsured and unable to pay the ever-increasing out-of-pocket-maximums allowed by law.
In no way is Ferguson’s police department working when an unarmed young man is shot, no matter how many other things are working, something isn’t working. In no way is everything working when four Americans die in Benghazi. Something went wrong.
Obamacare should stand as an ongoing example of the WRONG way to handle negative outcomes. OUTCOME informs our future conduct and if government doesn’t acknowledge BAD OUTCOME before justifying itself, then there is no confidence that bad outcomes will be reduced because there’s no change necessary if a bad outcome is defined as a good outcome.
In considering the OUTCOMES, consumers must insist that identifying a bad outcome take precedence. Spinning bad outcome as everything-going-according- to-plan is simply a deception that promises no relief to the American people.
