Return to Article: Congress critical in linking performance to budgets, NASA official says
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You have run into the difference between government and the private sector! Congress should not set or evaluate progress against specific goals for executive agencies. The President (through OMB) should evaluate programs and make recommendations to Congress. Congress only should respond by approving or changing the budget that is requested (in a timely manner!).
There are goals that need to be quantified and for which Congress is not qualified to quantify. For example, the Army needs X infantry soldiers ready to go. Who is to determine X - is it Congress or is it the administration working with DoD and OMB? It definitely should involve a discussion of a plan between the President and the military and not be determined by Congress. Then if we have no war to go to, is it waste to pay 500,000 infantry soldiers to be sitting around doing nothing? The Congressional goal should be that the military should be ready to go to war at a moment's notice - that is the policy. The President should determine that that means 500,000 soldiers sitting around waiting to go. If the public determines the President's interpretation of the policy is wrong - they fire him in the next election! That is how representative government should work!
Congress is far too involved in the nitty-gritty of running the government and not involved in the establishment of meaningful policy for the USA. Congress cannot even pass a budget for a fiscal year until the year is almost half over! How will they ever set goals? Academics have to get real - Congress should set policy and the executive branch should carry it out! Congress should not micro-manage! If the administration is not doing what the public thinks is necessary, they vote out the administration. Congress controls he purse strings so they may inflence the extent of the administration's activities. Congress should not set performance goals for agencies!
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