To recap: it is possible to put decent information into a Government Machine, have ordinary, good people running the thing, and a reasonable system in place, and still get utter idiocy out of the dispenser?""More than possible. Likely.

This place does not feel like my country. It feels like countries I have read about where things are very bad. It feels, in fact, like exactly the kind of thing we were protesting against, but we thought it was elsewhere. It is not heartening to find that it has come to us.

Garbage in, garbage out. Or rather more felicitously: the tree of nonsense is watered with error, and from its branches swing the pumpkins of disaster.

Now, are those engaged in the business of governing any different by nature from those they govern?""Yes. They're prideful and tend to sexual misconduct. Also, the situation of being in government tends to drive you mad.""But are they more virtuous or more intelligent? Or more compassionate?""Ha!""Let's call that one a 'no.

He concluded that governments were like wars: the reasons and the forces might change, but it was still the same dying over the same soil.