by Jack L. B. Gohn\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The Advocate and the Advisor were both good guys.\u00a0 For years they had run in the same professional circles, and they got along well.\u00a0 But the Advocate wanted the world to change.\u00a0 The Advisor thought the world was pretty good as it was.<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The Advocate wrote newspaper columns and lobbied the people in power for the changes he supported.\u00a0 The Advisor put in his years in a government agency and absorbed the values of that agency.\u00a0 He learned that there were reasons things were the way they were, and that there were hazards in disturbing them.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 One day a new Official came to run the agency, and rewarded the Advisor for his years of service by turning to the Advisor for advice about the agency\u2019s policies.\u00a0 The Advisor said the policies were just great, and that the Official should do nothing to change them.<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 One night shortly after the Official came to power, he was the guest of honor at a dinner.\u00a0 The Advocate attended the dinner, and, in the general discussion, criticized the agency\u2019s existing policies.\u00a0 The Official said he was being advised by the Advisor, and doubted the need for change.\u00a0 \u201cOh,\u201d said the Advocate, \u201cthe Advisor has been doing his job too long.\u00a0 You shouldn\u2019t be listening to him.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The Official went on listening to the Advisor anyway.\u00a0 And word of the Advocate\u2019s remark came to the ears of the Advisor.\u00a0 The Advisor was furious.\u00a0 He sat on his grudge for some years, but one day, when the Advisor and the Advocate were dealing with each other on other business, the Advisor\u2019s wrath bubbled over.<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cYou told my brand-new boss to fire me!\u201d the Advisor exclaimed.\u00a0 \u201cNo,\u201d said the Advocate, \u201cI told him not to listen to you.\u00a0 I\u2019m sorry your feelings were hurt.\u201d\u00a0 And of course a great deal more was said.<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 As always happens in such confrontations, the parties also had plenty of leisure to consider the matter afterwards.\u00a0 History does not record what the Advisor thought, but these were the ruminations of the Advocate …<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u201cHe was part-way right,\u201d the Advocate thought.\u00a0 \u201cI wasn\u2019t telling the Official to fire the Advisor, but I was begging the Official to take the Advisor out of the policy-advising loop just after he had got into it.\u00a0 I was<\/em> trying to spike the Advisor\u2019s career.\u201d\u00a0 And what kind of person does that \u2013 especially to someone he respects?<\/em> the Advocate asked himself.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Someone who cares about the policies in play<\/em>, the answer came back.\u00a0 The Advisor had quite decidedly made himself the foe of the policy changes the Advocate was quite sure were needed.\u00a0 He had identified himself with a status quo that needed changing.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Hence the Advocate, to do his job thoroughly, had to propose that the Official ignore the Advisor, even if that were bad for the Advisor\u2019s career.\u00a0 This was sad, but it was inherent in the Advisor\u2019s job \u2013 and the Advocate\u2019s.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 You can\u2019t make an omelet without breaking eggs, the Advocate thought.\u00a0 To be a serious policy advocate will at times require opposing the career goals of certain public officials.\u00a0 Major changes usually fail unless partisans of the old ways are pulled away from the controls.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 And government employees who make policy are expected to know this going in, whether it\u2019s written down or not.\u00a0 They are accountable for their views, and the currency in which they render account may well be their careers.\u00a0 That is a major reason why political appointees and policy-making officials are more apt to serve at someone\u2019s pleasure, without civil service protections.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 This is not necessarily personal, the Advocate reflected, just the rules of the game.\u00a0 The well-known friendship of Orrin Hatch and Ted Kennedy was deep, but each of them would have cheered had the other one\u2019s Senate seat changed parties.\u00a0 Each lent aid and comfort to his friend\u2019s political foes.\u00a0 Their opposition was as real as their friendship \u2013 and each was legitimate.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Having elevated himself into the world of policy-making, the Advocate\u2019s friend the Advisor had thus opened himself up to calls for his ouster, calls delivered by people like the Advocate who bore him no personal ill-will.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Of course there had been more to the conversation.\u00a0 \u201cWho appointed you to sit in judgment over people and policies?\u201d the Advisor had asked the Advocate.\u00a0 \u201cLawmakers haven\u2019t passed the laws you propose, and courts have rejected your views of the laws that exist.\u00a0 Maybe they\u2019re right and you\u2019re wrong?\u201d<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The Advocate certainly had to acknowledge that possibility.\u00a0 And the Advocate knew that that possibility carried with it a great responsibility.\u00a0 Before you yell \u201cOff with their heads!\u201d about the ancien r\u00e9gime<\/em>, you had better be as sure as possible that you are right about the reasons why.\u00a0 You had better weigh carefully the merits of the status quo.\u00a0 And if you speak ill of anyone, you had better do it on good evidence, for serious reasons and carefully, not for sport.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 To help the Advocate examine his conscience in this wise, the Advisor, an heir to the best traditions of public service in his agency, extolled how honorable, public spirited, and under-appreciated he and his colleagues were.\u00a0 Could the Advocate say the same about himself?\u00a0 Or was the Advocate just ego-tripping?<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 In the end, the Advocate concluded, after trying to think it through, no one can fully answer such a question for himself.\u00a0 Humans are not well-equipped to be reliable in introspection.\u00a0 But if, along with Martin Luther, you feel that you can do no other, then you have to proceed.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 And sometimes that does mean calling for public servants to step aside.\u00a0 And because this is not some abstract exercise, but one in which the things you say might lead to people getting hurt, you cannot be shocked or hurt in your turn when you occasion hurt feelings and hard feelings.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 It\u2019s nothing personal.\u00a0 And it\u2019s all personal.<\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The Advocate and the Advisor were both good guys.\u00a0\u00a0 But there were limits to how good they could be to each other.\u00a0 One was, after all, an Advisor.\u00a0 And the other was an Advocate.<\/p>\n Copyright (c) Jack L. B. Gohn<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Government employees who make policy are expected to know this going in, whether it\u2019s written down or not. 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