Rocket Man
The other day, after news stories about the second of Musk’s SpaceX rocket in a row exploding (sorry, I mean having a Rapid Unscheduled Disassembly…), his put out a comment that “Rockets are hard.”
Quite the defense, that. Especially from the man who in charged with his Musketeens to completely go through the entire U.S. government, eliminate the deficit and make it efficient. (Sorry, I mean have a Rapid Scheduled Disassembly.)
And yes, rockets are hard. Incredibly hard. That’s why we have NASA and some of the most brilliant, professional scientists drawn for around the country working on them as a team. And even they fail on occasion, or even have disasters. And when they do have an explosion (yes, they actually them that), they don’t get to shrug it and the next one off with just a “Hey, rockets are hard, man.” They are held accountable and go through detailed reviews to find out what actually went wrong, not just, well, things happen because…wow, that is hard.
By the way, you know what else is hard? Completely going through the entire U.S. government, agency by agency to eliminate the deficit and make everything efficient.
Screwing that up and blaming it on being “hard” is no defense. Of course it’s hard. That’s why you have experts do it. And why you have people experienced do it. And why you have people who answer to others do it. And why you do it carefully, judiciously.
Rather than have a bunch of inexperienced kids, including those fired for hacking their own company and passing information to competitors. And, for that matter, having someone in charge who has absolutely zero experience doing what he was put in charge to do.
Because it’s hard.
And not just hard, but the thing is when your rockets keep rapidly disassembling when unscheduled, the worst that happens is that you lose a disassembled rocket and cause airports to delay their flights. (Unless, of course the disassembled parts crash into a home or buildings, or unless anyone is inside.) But when you rapidly disassemble government and don’t know what you’re doing, many tends of millions of people can have their lives uprooted. And in many ways, that’s “at best.” Because at worst is that you rapidly disassemble democracy, and fascism pushes its way in.
“Rockets are hard.” Spare us the incompetence to think that is an excuse for failure. It’s part of a reason for failure. But it’s not an excuse.
Doing medical surgery is hard. But if a doctor screws up, and a patient is maimed or dies, saying, “Surgery is hard” will not protect you from malpractice.
Most high-level professions, most jobs that matter and impact people’s lives are hard. That’s why we have universities. And training programs. And internships. And job reviews. And it’s why people get promoted or fired. And rewarded or sued -- or even jailed.
Life is hard. And if someone rapidly disassembles yours when unscheduled, the result may seem as similar to you as that of a SpaceX rocket.
"It's hard" is what a little kid says when trying to open a child-proof bottle of prescription medicine. "It's hard" is what you say when given a Rubik's Cube and told to solve it in five minutes. Rockets and government are a whole, completely higher, monumentally different level of critical demanding.
Musk keeps saying “We’re going to get things wrong.” And keeps getting things wrong. And keeps explaining explosions by saying “This is hard.” And keep calling explosions “Rapid Unscheduled Disassembly,” in hope to hide the failure.
In most jobs, that’s not acceptable. I’m guessing that when Musk asks anyone at any of his companies in charge of a project that went wrong, let alone disastrously wrong -- and repeatedly wrong -- what happened, if they said “It was hard,” they wouldn’t have that job any longer.
Yes, rockets are hard. It's just that when that’s the excuse you use, it's a signal you’re going to have a whole lot of Rapid Unscheduled Disassembly.
And as we've been seeing, this is the same Musk philosophy and expertise that’s in charge of government efficiency.
It’s hard.
Yes. It is.
That's why you use experts and concern and care.
And why, without them, the results, as we’ve seen, follow the same philosophy and expertise as with his rockets.
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