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NASA Employee Suspended For Blogging At Work
Posted by
CmdrTaco
on Wed May 28, 2008 11:00 AM
from the but-i-wanna-blog-now dept.
from the but-i-wanna-blog-now dept.
BobJacobsen writes "FCW has an article about a NASA employee that was suspended for blogging on government time. Seems the unnamed employee's 'politically partisan' blog entries were a violation of the Hatch Act. The article ends with a chilling quote from the government's Special Counsel in the case: 'Today, modern office technology multiplies the opportunities for employees to abuse their positions and — as in this serious case — to be penalized, even removed from their job, with just a few clicks of a mouse.'" Thing is, he was soliciting campaign donations and writing partisan stuff.
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fair enough (Score:5, Funny)
Re:fair enough (Score:4, Funny)
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Obligatory (Score:5, Funny)
<Ben174> : If they only realized 90% of the overtime they pay me is only cause i like staying here playing with Kazaa when the bandwidth picks up after hours.
<ChrisLMB> : If any of my employees did that they'd be fired instantly.
<Ben174> : Where u work?
<ChrisLMB> : I'm the CTO at LowerMyBills.com
*** Ben174 (BenWright@TeraPro33-41.LowerMyBills.com) Quit (Leaving)
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Re:fair enough (Score:5, Insightful)
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Eh.... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Eh.... (Score:4, Funny)
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Well gosh. (Score:5, Insightful)
Then he should have had a little discipline and waited till he was home.
So... (Score:5, Funny)
Perhaps the Special Counsel should be fired for "being a total idiot."
He did work at NASA.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Can't imagine it would be too difficult for a NASA engineer to write a program that automates political blogging to the point that you can get a new post out with a few clicks. Especially considering the 'quality' of some of the blogs out there....
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Political autoblogging form (Score:5, Funny)
( ) New York Times
( ) LA Times
( ) Washington Post
is reporting that the government
( ) is censoring scientists with unpleasant news.
( ) is going to cut back program _________.
( ) has been engaging in warrantless wiretapping.
( ) wants to raise taxes.
( ) plans to institute new product regulations
This is just another case of
( ) Big Government ramming itself down our throats!
( ) the War on Science!
( ) how conservatives are killing the safety net!
( ) government punishing anyone productive!
( ) how the country's becoming a totalitarian dictatorship!
HT:
( ) Digg
( ) Slashdot
( ) Technorati
( ) The other blogger who's a carbon copy of me
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He deserved it... (Score:5, Funny)
Hatch Act (Score:5, Informative)
This [osc.gov] nice writeup. Bottom line is, this guy's a federal employee soliciting funds and pushing a political agenda on work time.
This of course has nothing to do with blogging, as you could replace "blogging" with "making phone calls" or "mailing letters" or "stalking people at the coffee maker".
Re:Hatch Act (Score:5, Informative)
In particular, the Hatch act has nothing to do with whether you are at work or not. The Hatch act prohibits a government employee from doing pretty much anything political even on your own time and with your own equipment. It is pretty draconian. And, of course, it only applies to peons; those high-level muck-a-mucks who are most likely to be abusing their positions are exempt. The excuse for all this is that it "protects" the employees from political pressure. Pretty lame excuse, though.
The bit about doing this stuff on government time is completely unrelated to the Hatch act. That's a distinctly separate offense, and one for which there is much less excuse.
It is unclear from the article whether the suspension was really because of the Hatch act offense or the use of government time.equipment. I suppose it could have been both.
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Re:Hatch Act (Score:5, Informative)
We can also still run for and hold local office as long as we're not violating any conflict of interest rules.
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Re:Hatch Act (Score:5, Informative)
If you would have read the linked resource in the parent post that you responded to, you would have known why that isn't a violation of the Hatch Act. This is a list of who cannot participate in partisan activities [osc.gov]. You will notice that the president does not fall into that heading. Not to mention that every US President that I can remember has politicked for members of his party, so I don't know why you are singling out ole George.
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Hatch Act wasn't do depoliticize politics (Score:5, Informative)
While we joke about government employees being "lazy, incompetent, over/under paid, whatever," without a professional Civil Servants class it becomes a cesspool of corruption. As the public employees are normally unionized with a union that can both fight management (as a union) and change management (as a political organization), they are generally well paid and compensated, particularly with pension benefits and other back end benefits that politicians can approve and leave someone else with the bill. As a result, those jobs are potentially very desirable.
If you don't keep the political bosses away, watch how quickly jobs go to politically connected people that don't show up to work... It seems unlikely that someone powerful would care about a 30k - 90k/year job, but what if they could get it for their daughter-in-law that doesn't work, and just funnel money and benefits to their kids. That's how these positions work in countries without extensive controls, and why we have so many to keep the "friends and family plan" out.
Look at any community non profit and look at how many incompetent people hold well paying jobs because someone that gives money is friends with their parents/grandparents... corruption happens everywhere, and this attempts to reduce it. It doesn't attempt to remove partisanship from politics.
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Well, (Score:4, Funny)
If the employee's views agree with mine, then they are jackbooted fascist thugs for suspending him.
If I disagree with those views, then the employee has every right to deal with this inappropriate use of paid time.
Government jobs (Score:4, Informative)
Ideally... (Score:5, Insightful)
That said, whatever political activism people want to take part in should use their own time and their own equipment -- unless their job IS political activism. TFA doesn't say what this guy's job is, but I seriously doubt it"s "chief nasa suck-up to potential future presidents."
If he's using NASA equipment, NASA time, and identifying himself as a NASA employee, then he's basically creating a situation in which causual observers might be forgiven for assuming that NASA is endorsing "candidate x"
Quite frankly, it doesn't make sense for a department, which is often the subject of political punches, to want to be seen as interested - because if "their guy" lost, then the other guy will take it out on them.
Sucks for this guy, but if you work at NASA you should be smart enough to know better.
Why blame the Internet? (Score:5, Interesting)
There often however is an unfair difference between surfing Playboy and reading the Playboy magazine during the office hours. One is easier to detect and prove then the other. It will be used often as an excuse to fire people, because prove is so much easier to get.
At least In Belgium you need a valid reason before you fire somebody without having to pay weeks or months salary, so they will need this proof. People drinking coffee and having cigarette breaks all the time are much less likely to get fired on the spot.
It has to be said that many companies in Belgium will do the firing of people in several steps. Vocal warning, 2 or thre written warnings, firing the person.
No Surprise Here (Score:4, Informative)
Second, the Hatch Act has, for decades, prohibited partisan political activity by federal employees. There's good reason, if only because those employees make decisions every day about how and where to spend taxpayer money.
Third, the provisions of the Hatch Act are made clear to every federal employee when they accept the job.
This stuff went on on Usenet... (Score:4, Interesting)
He should have been fired (Score:4, Interesting)
A more important issue is what this says about the bloat and inefficiency at NASA. If an employee can spend years working on their blog at work, it is because they are not being given enough real work to do.
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Re:He should have been fired (Score:5, Insightful)
You don't get fired from any job for anything but the most egregious actions, like embezzlement or not showing up without calling in (or in Disney World if you are a Pluto, lifting your leg at a fire hydrant or cursing in public).
First, unlike you teenagers, adults go to work to earn a living. Supervisors, unlike the corporations they work for, empathise with this. You don't deprive a person of their livelihood for something trivial.
Second, it costs the employer money to place a person in any given job. There are hiring costs and training costs, and then it takes time for a new employee to get up to speed. That's not to mention unemployment insurance benefits.
If the person's getting his job done, you don't fire him, you use lesser punishment.
Many (actually most I've worked at) jobs have slow periods and times where there is too much work to keep up with. When I worked in the merchandise division at Disney in the early '80s, for example, there would be a half hour of tedius, mind-numbing boredon followed by more "guests" (as Disney called their customers) than one could reasonably keep up with.
Other jobs have had days with nothing to do but read the paper, followed by overtime. Life doesn't always run on a smooth schedule, kid.
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Re:why a lower standard for government workers? (Score:5, Insightful)
Is it OK to spend 5 minutes in the hallway talking to co-workers about the big game last night? Some places/bosses wouldn't care. Others would. Some places give you breaks and lunches. Many professionals don't a whistle that blows telling them it's break time. They manage their own time.
There is no "one size fits all here". And certainly no "lower standard" you could guess at based on the article.
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