Boz,

I'm very sorry, but I really can't let you get away with this. I drove a bus for the Dade County government (Miami) for 16 years, and I take some pride in the certainty that I have more first-hand experience with government corruption and stupidity than anybody else on SOWPUB.

I got a million of 'em, just from working for one agency in one county in one state in the U.S. How about this quickie as an example:

In 2009, a night janitor at the Transit Agency was finally cleaning out a cubicle that had been empty for several weeks, on the 16th floor of the Agency's Overtown office complex. He opened a file and found ... about $10,000 in cash. Plus about $15,000 in uncashed checks.

The janitor, bless his heart, turns this all in to his supervisor. Investigation begins. The employee who had been in the cubicle was responsible for the Transit Agency's Visitor Pass program. He sold Visitor Passes and took in the cash and the checks.

The Agency had not set up any system for depositing the $$. Guy asked his supervisor more than once, but never got any answer. So he stuck the cash and checks in a file each day for 2 1/2 years. County never wondered why no $$ was coming in from all the Visitor Passes. The employee's questions of what to do with it were never answered.

He got another job and left the Agency. He just moved out of his cubicle and left it all there. Police said the loss may have been as much as $120,000, but how could anybody prove anything? There were no records.

This story highlights the #1 problem with every form of government: it's not their money. If it was their money, they would care. But since it's just taxpayer's money, then losing it is no big deal. There's always more where that came from.

Richard