By Polly Tickle
WASHINGTON D.C. – In what critics have dubbed the most predictable revelation since sunrise, a government-commissioned report on bureaucratic inefficiency has concluded that the only solution is – you guessed it – more bureaucracy. The bombshell recommendation calls for establishing a new ‘Department of Bureaucratic Oversight’ tasked with investigating the labyrinthine workings of existing agencies.
“It’s brilliant in its simplicity,” commented Senator Windleton P. Longbottom, a staunch proponent of the plan. “If bureaucracy is the problem, then clearly more bureaucracy is the answer!”
The report itself, a staggering 4,000 pages in length, outlines plans for a hierarchical structure to rival the most intricate of federal agencies. The proposed ‘Bureaucratic Oversight’ department would include:
- The Office of Redundancy Identification (staffed to investigate overlap between other, similar offices)
- The Committee of Procedural Complexity (charged with ensuring all new investigative processes are sufficiently convoluted)
- The Subcommittee on Inter-Agency Acronym Generation (because a DBO isn’t official without a cryptic code name)
The report emphasizes that investigations would require a minimum of 5 years, with a budget provision for 5,000 freshly-minted government-issued coffee mugs.
News of the proposal has been met with a mixture of exasperation and eye-rolling amusement from exasperated citizens. “If you want to create an endless loop,” quipped one Twitter commentator, “Ask the government to solve a problem with itself.”
Economic analysts warn of the cascading cost associated with a new layer of bureaucratic self-examination. Meanwhile, political satirists are gleeful – this material practically writes itself.
Stay tuned! Experts predict additional reports investigating the investigative bureaucracy, followed by the formation of a task force to determine whether the initial investigative report was sufficiently thorough.