When being told how to do your job is more important than actually doing your job:

House Speaker Thom Tillis, Rep. Tim Moffitt, R-Buncombe, and Rep. Jason Saine, R-Lincoln, left early Thursday to attend the ALEC Spring Task Force meeting in Oklahoma City, scheduled for Thursday and Friday. "Unique to ALEC Task Forces is the public-private partnership," the website says. "Legislators welcome their private sector counterparts to the table as equals, working in unison to solve the challenges facing our nation."

Translated: "Corporations have learned that sending lobbyists to individual states costs a hell of a lot of money, and you can get into some deep shit if some of the states have clamped down on influence buying and other unethical practices. This way, the elected officials go see the lobbyists, and then go back home with corporation-friendly policies to enact without upsetting the sheep..., I mean, without bothering their constituents with all this technical stuff."

From the National Women's Law Center's email today:

Did you see the news? Like magic, just before Members of Congress headed home (many on airplanes), they quickly passed a bill to prevent long delays at airports — delays caused by the draconian federal budget cuts known as the "sequester," including furloughs of air traffic controllers. How convenient!

From this experience we learn that Congress actually can act quickly — really, really quickly — if it wants to. So we have a question for you, Congress: What about fixing the rest of the sequester — especially the cuts to essential services for low-income women and their families?

Fired up? Now is the time to tell your Members of Congress to fix the sequester!

Is it possible we have arrived at a point in history where good Republicans are a dying breed?

In 30-plus years as a business consultant and writer, I've come across many situations where the concept of optimum minimum applies. As a way to ensure effective use of resources in the face of certain risks, optimum minimum is the gold standard for many business investments. It's also the most effective model for thinking about the value and roles of government.