But… even given them not being that clever, you’d think they’d know that the ability to arbitrarily slice and dice a bill would be too much. (I know I may be displaying hindsight bias, but… they’re politicians! They have to have had experience with, say, people taking their (or colleagues’) words out of context and making it sound like something else, or they themselves doing it to an opponent, right?
ie, the ability to slice and dice some communication into something entirely different would be something you’d think they’d already have personal experience with. At least, that’s what I’d imagine. Though, still, Hanlon’s Razor and all that.
Many many years ago, I was contacted by a coworker for an estimate of what it would take to modify our tax-calculation code to support a new law recently passed by the Texas legislature, which specified that the first $25 of Internet charges for Texas-residential subscribers was free of state taxes.
I asked “Well, that depends. What does ‘first’ mean? If they mean that on every bill we should reduce the taxable basis by $25, we can do that easily. If they mean that on every bill we should chronologically sort all the charges and then exclude those charges from taxation, that’s far more complicated, and if tax rates vary depending on the charge the result will be different. If they actually mean the first $25 for each subscriber rather than on each bill, that’s easier (but different from the first two options).”
The coworker said “Excellent question. I’ll ask the client.”
A week later, she forwarded me email from the client rep, saying “Excellent question. I’ve asked our lawyers.”
A month later she forwarded me email from the client rep forwarded from the lawyers saying “Excellent question. We’ve asked the State Legislature.”
Several months later, the consensus seemed to be that the State Legislature had never given any thought to what they meant by “first”.
My confidence in politicians’ taking care about what they mean is very low.
But… even given them not being that clever, you’d think they’d know that the ability to arbitrarily slice and dice a bill would be too much. (I know I may be displaying hindsight bias, but… they’re politicians! They have to have had experience with, say, people taking their (or colleagues’) words out of context and making it sound like something else, or they themselves doing it to an opponent, right?
ie, the ability to slice and dice some communication into something entirely different would be something you’d think they’d already have personal experience with. At least, that’s what I’d imagine. Though, still, Hanlon’s Razor and all that.
Many many years ago, I was contacted by a coworker for an estimate of what it would take to modify our tax-calculation code to support a new law recently passed by the Texas legislature, which specified that the first $25 of Internet charges for Texas-residential subscribers was free of state taxes.
I asked “Well, that depends. What does ‘first’ mean? If they mean that on every bill we should reduce the taxable basis by $25, we can do that easily. If they mean that on every bill we should chronologically sort all the charges and then exclude those charges from taxation, that’s far more complicated, and if tax rates vary depending on the charge the result will be different. If they actually mean the first $25 for each subscriber rather than on each bill, that’s easier (but different from the first two options).”
The coworker said “Excellent question. I’ll ask the client.”
A week later, she forwarded me email from the client rep, saying “Excellent question. I’ve asked our lawyers.”
A month later she forwarded me email from the client rep forwarded from the lawyers saying “Excellent question. We’ve asked the State Legislature.”
Several months later, the consensus seemed to be that the State Legislature had never given any thought to what they meant by “first”.
My confidence in politicians’ taking care about what they mean is very low.
Ouch.