Chances are that if your employer learned you had posted videos on the Internet to brag about how you were wasting the company's money, you would be fired immediately.
Of course, that assumes your employer is not the federal government.
On April 2, the General Services Administration was shaken by a report that one of its divisions had spent more than $800,000 for a lavish conference held near Las Vegas. The agency's head, Martha Johnson, and two of her aides resigned over the scandal.
To date, however, there have been no reports of firings of GSA officials and/or employees actually involved in wasting taxpayers' money through the conference.
Several GSA employees apparently take pride in their ability to live it up on the public's dime without worrying about unpleasant consequences. Videos purporting to show GSA employees bragging about their free-spending habits - and how they are able to get away with abusing the public's trust - have been posted on the Internet.
One video showed someone who was identified as a GSA employee at the Las Vegas event strumming on a ukulele and singing a tune about the agency's high-spending, money-wasting culture.
It is possible, of course, the videos do not involve government employees. They may have been produced and posted by others, as pranks. This is doubtful, however.
It should not be difficult to find out. Someone, perhaps government co-workers or supervisors, will recognize those in the videos. If they are government employees, they should be fired immediately - no questions asked, no excuses accepted.
Also insulting to taxpayers was a report of many fake awards rewarded to justify these types of events. According to one GSA employee quoted in a report on the junket, one such presentation was the "jackass award," given to an employee judged to have done "something stupid," the employee told the inspector general.
There is no doubt this award was earned. It may have been the most fitting thing about this whole sordid episode.
This kind of abuse has to stop, and it will not until and unless those directly responsible are handed pink slips.
