When politicians announce billions in savings, do not applaud until you inspect the arithmetic, the contracts, and the suspiciously empty space where the receipts should be. Government officials love announcing savings. Savings sound responsible. Savings sound efficient. Savings fit beautifully inside a social media graphic designed for people who will never ask whether the money …
A government algorithm denies benefits. A surveillance platform identifies the wrong person. An automated fraud system freezes assistance. Suddenly, everyone involved develops a severe allergy to active verbs. The agency blames the contractor. The contractor says it followed agency requirements. The program office says technology staff handled it. Technology staff point toward legal counsel. Legal …
A government contract may display the name of one large corporation, but that does not mean one company is performing all the work. The prime contractor may quietly divide the project among data brokers, cloud providers, consultants, software developers, staffing companies, and surveillance vendors. Those hidden companies can collect the information, build the system, train …
Resistance Survival Guide #304 Political patronage rarely announces itself with a villain speech and a monogrammed corruption cape. It usually appears as a pattern. The same names show up on advisory boards. The same donors become vendors. The same staffers become lobbyists. The same nonprofit boards overlap with public contracts. The same families, firms, and …