FOXNews.com: GSA betrayed public trust, Secret Service did not

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GSA betrayed public trust, Secret Service did not Apr 17th 2012, 15:16 Not all scandals are alike, and nowhere is that more true than in the case of recent events at the General Services Administration and the Secret Service.   Don't get me wrong, neither story is anything to be proud of, but even if the worst is confirmed regarding the behavior of 11 Secret Service personnel in Cartagena, the scenarios are fundamentally different and the GSA story is far worse. To be sure, the agents who are suspected of bringing prostitutes to their hotel rooms clearly violated what Secret Service Assistant Director Paul S. Morrissey described as the service's "zero-tolerance policy on personal misconduct." The agents broke no laws, and so far, there is no indication that they opened themselves up to the possibility of being blackmailed in light of engaging in behavior which they probably would not want made public.   In other words, they betrayed the public image of the Secret Service, and to a lesser extent, that of the nation.  Unlike employees at the GSA however, they did not betray the public trust. Spending over $823,000 for a few days in Las Vegas, even for 300 people, as GSA did, is simply nuts.   Let's do the math. That comes out to almost $3,00 a head, in a city where they are practically giving away hotel rooms because the local economy is so bad!  But it is not only crazy, it is offensive.   Not only was this a case of financial mismanagement, it was a case of  brazenly spending other people's money – yours and mine – because those who did so had no regard for the finances of those they serve – you and me. We must insist that the first questions asked in any government agency are, "are we providing the greatest possible value to the American people, and doing so in a way which builds their confidence in our ability to do so?"   - Rabbi Brad Hirschfield Yes, those are strong words, and I would hesitate to use them if the Las Vegas event had been an isolated incident.  In fact, no organization is immune from mistakes and occasional over-indulgence.  But in the case of the GSA, it's systematic.   It extends to spending $330,000 dollars to relocate a single employee to Hawaii, and authorizing multiple staff members to spend 7 days in those same islands in order to attend a one-hour ceremony.  And those are just a few examples from among the many which have surfaced recently, let alone those that surely will. The issue at GSA is not simply, as some are suggesting, about the need for competitive bidding or tougher spending guidelines.  That would simply add more bureaucracy to fight the current one.  That may actually be necessary, in the short term at least, but that is not the real issue here.   The issue here is trust, especially at time when trust in the government's ability to use citizen's money wisely is at or near an all time low.   When government officials fail to act as good stewards of the nation's dollars, they are not only wasting money, they betray the trust of the American public.  And once betrayed, trust is a very difficult thing to reestablish.  Doing so will certainly require more than a few firings and demotions.  And it's not likely to be reestablished through lengthy, costly, and likely politically-charged hearings in Congress either. Of course, the GSA scandal is actually both a challenge and opportunity.    The challenge lies in seeing the full dimensions of the problem which the agency's abusive spending represents, the fact that people are responding so sharply because of the broad scale loss of faith in government agencies to accomplish even those tasks which most Americans support, and in responding more intelligently than we typically do at these moments. The opportunity lies in people being willing to ask not simply how to preserve or kill any particular program, initiative or agency, but in assuring that public employees see themselves as stewards of the public trust.   We must insist that the first questions asked in any government agency are, "are we providing the greatest possible value to the American people, and doing so in a way which builds their confidence in our ability to do so?"   Arguments about big government vs. small government will come and go, but wherever anyone comes out on that issue, those are the real questions that must be asked by both sides. And they must be asked, each and every day, in order to build up trust in our government, no matter how big or small it is. Rabbi Brad Hirschfield is

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