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spiral78
Joined: 05 Apr 2004
Posts: 11534
Location: On a Short Leash
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 Posted: Wed Feb 01, 2012 2:53 pm Post subject: Bureaucracy: official foolishness |
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It's endemic worldwide.
My point of origin (the US) perhaps leads the pack, but I have just stumbled upon this gem about official foolishness in Russia (Russophites, please feel entirely free to retaliate with examples of Western foolishness!!).
Great saving virtue among Kremlin officials: there seems to be some official acknowledgement that foolishness is rampant - and a bt of a sense of humour about it all. Kudos!
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In the eyes of the Russian bureaucracy, having no legs is not enough to qualify for permanent disability. A legless citizen, apart from dealing with cities that are about as wheelchair accessible as an Amazonian rainforest, must stand in line every two years to file a document proving that he has no legs. Otherwise, the state apparently assumes that the limbs have grown back, stopping providing benefits. This absurd piece of red tape comes up repeatedly on the Kremlin's newest website, Russia Without Fools, which was launched over the weekend as a kind of register of bureaucratic inanity, or as President Dmitri Medvedev called it, a "stupidity contest."
Most of the content describes bizarre encounters with officialdom � a letter sent to the prosecutor's office, for instance, comes back with a note saying that no such organization exists � but the site also has a competition for elocutionary gems. The Russian Health Minister, Tatyana Golikova, took second place in the vote for saying: "We need to catch more diseases and learn to cure them in a way that does not cause death." But she was beaten to the crown by an equally morbid comment from the chief of the Central Elections Commission, Vladimir Churov. "I look at life optimistically," he is quoted as saying. "When someone asks how life is going, one should answer, 'I'm looking for a grave site.'"
Read more: http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2105235,00.html#ixzz1l8rojFuw |
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Sashadroogie
Joined: 17 Apr 2007
Posts: 11061
Location: Moskva, The Workers' Paradise
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| Posted: Wed Feb 01, 2012 5:59 pm Post subject: |
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| Ah but Spiral, these are mild examples - ferociously mild. |
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spiral78
Joined: 05 Apr 2004
Posts: 11534
Location: On a Short Leash
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| Posted: Wed Feb 01, 2012 6:06 pm Post subject: |
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| Do tell:-) |
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