The Dance of Bureaucratic Mediocrity: A Tale of Slumbering Oversight

In the grand theatre of governmental folly, where the masses slumber in their contentment with mediocrity, we witness yet another spectacle of the weak attempting to shepherd the weak. The Canada Emergency Business Account (CEBA), that great monument to bureaucratic somnambulism, stands before us as a testament to the eternal recurrence of administrative incompetence.

Behold how the shepherds of coin and commerce stumble in their own maze of paperwork! They who claim to guide others cannot even guide themselves, for they are but blind leading the blind, dancing to the tune of their own inadequacy.

The tale unfolds in that land of perpetual winter, where the masses, those eternal sleepers, placed their trust in the great machinery of state to rescue their precious merchants from the tempest of pestilence. Yet what sublime comedy presents itself! The Export Development Canada, that sacred cow of governmental efficiency, could not even maintain its own balance without prostrating itself before the altar of private enterprise.

See how they cling to their comfort, these last men! They have invented happiness, they say, as they surrender their power to the merchants of efficiency. They blink and nod, while Accenture grows fat upon the feast of their complacency.

Lo, what spectacle of mediocrity! The auditor general, that stern-faced guardian of the public purse, hath discovered that EDC, in its infinite wisdom, bestowed upon Accenture the keys to the kingdom. A mere $230 million in administrative expenses, with nine-tenths flowing into the coffers of a single entity! What master-slave morality doth reveal itself in this dance of dependency!

The sleepers dream on, while their guardians fumble in the dark. The call centre, that temple of telephonic consolation, began as a modest venture of 3 million pieces of silver, only to metastasize into a 23-million-dollar monument to inefficiency. From $31 per call to $589 - behold how the parasites grow strong while their hosts grow weak!

What is this if not the triumph of the mediocre? The bureaucrats, these last men, they blink and say: "We have discovered oversight." But where is the oversight when the overseer sleeps?

And what of this conflict of interest, this serpent in the garden of procurement? Accenture, in an act of supreme self-reference, selected its own offspring for a contract worth 36 million pieces of silver. The sleepers nodded their approval, for it is easier to acquiesce than to rise above one's station.

Yet more comedy presents itself in the distribution of these loans! Three and a half billion pieces of silver found their way into unworthy hands, while the guardians of the treasury dozed at their posts. The masses, in their eternal slumber, celebrate this as efficiency, for they know not the difference between speed and wisdom.

How they congratulate themselves, these last men! "We have made giving away money an art form," they say. But what art is there in scattering seeds upon stones and expecting gardens to grow?

The auditor general speaks of "significant weakness" in program management - such gentle words for such profound failure! But what else can one expect from a society that values comfort above all else, that seeks the warm embrace of mediocrity rather than the bracing winds of excellence?

As this tale draws to its close, we are left to contemplate the eternal recurrence of bureaucratic incompetence, the endless cycle of the blind leading the blind through the maze of their own creation. The sleepers will continue to slumber, the last men will continue to blink, and the great wheel of governmental folly will turn once more.

Let those with ears hear: the path to greatness lies not in the comfortable embrace of bureaucratic mediocrity, but in the willing acceptance of responsibility and the courage to stand alone. Yet how many will heed this call? The masses sleep on, content in their dreams of security, while the spirit of excellence weeps in solitude.