"The government is the place all the problems the private sector won’t solve go"

Monday, April 21, 2025

This conversation between Jon Stewart and Michael Lewis has so many little nuggets and amazing stories that I can’t really pick out an excerpt to quote below. You should stop and listen to the entire thing when you can, all hour and 20 minutes of this, including the post-episode discussion with the producers (which has a hilarious moment about the tush push). I know many people that work in government, and I worked on a government technology project when I was first starting my career. I’ve seen the good and the bad. Michael Lewis’s new book sounds like it does the hard work of showing the kind of people that go into government service. While the stereotype is that government service tends to attract those who couldn’t make it in the private sector, the reality is that many go into government service because they want to serve. The career folks in government service do many amazing things that fly under the radar. I loved this discussion for introducing 3 amazing stories to me, along with a ton of other insights.