Self-Licking Ice Cream Cones

The US military has some very colorful expressions – many, if not most, simply not appropriate for this publication.  One of the idioms that I always found to be deliciously descriptive yet imaginatively intriguing was the phrase, “Self-licking ice cream cone.”

The first use of the phrase is thought to have been in a 1992 paper by Pete Worden, then a US Air Force officer, titled “On Self-Licking Ice Cream Cones” critical of  NASA's bureaucracy.   Worden later worked on Capitol Hill, an experience that led him to say that NASA actually stood for "Never A Straight Answer.”  Ironically, after his retirement as a Brigadier General, Worden became the Director of NASA's Ames Research Centerin California.

 Worden, being a little unconventional, was known to occasionally appear in costume, “usually dressing as either Darth Vader, a wizard, or after arriving at NASA, as a goat herder.”   This behavior resulted in an “inquiry from Senator Chuck Grassley that led to an investigation by the NASA inspector general's office into a private project to photograph a group of Viking re-enactors….Although concluding that no government money had been spent on the Viking re-enactment, the investigation itself was estimated to have cost between $40,000 and $600,000.”  Only our Government can waste like that.

America’s prosperity has enabled a standard of living unmatched in human history.  It also has allowed for excesses and intemperance to the point of impending self-destruction.  Unfortunately, Americans, like our bureaucracies, are prone to obesity.  


The General Accountability Office (GAO) reports, “From 2004 to 2012, the federal non-postal civilian workforce grew by 258,882 employees, from 1.88 million to 2.13 million, an increase of 14 percent.”   According to a June 22, 2015 publication of The Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), 35 percent of men and 37 percent of women were obese, and over 65 percent of the United States population is overweight. Clearly, in many instances, bigger is not always better.

What can prevent this proclivity for counter-productive growth from leading to our self-destruction?  Most likely, reduction will not occur until the pain produced by the problem of unbridled growth becomes so severe that reduction becomes more attractive than an externally imposed dieting plan or an uncomfortable girdle.   Thus the intrinsic problem with the self-licking ice cream cone – it simply doesn’t have the will-power to stop itself. Perhaps nowhere is the self-licking, self-fulfilling nature of government bureaucracy more evident than in the government school system teacher unions.

Richard Berman, reporting on the 2014 elections explains, “Teacher unions have spent hundreds of millions of dollars obstructing reasonable reforms to ‘last in, first out’ hiring policies, seniority-based pay, and teacher tenure that could improve the status quo that protects unions and incompetence in the classroom at the expense of students. In practice, this means quid pro quo agreements with political candidates where campaign contributions are traded for promises of an anti-reform agenda.” 

Consider this cautionary tale of Government’s attempt to reform itself:

The government had a vast scrap yard in the middle of a desert. Recognizing someone may steal from it, they created a night watchman position (GS-4) and hired a person for the job. Then they said, "How can the watchman do his job without instruction?" So they created a planning position and hired two people: one to write the instructions (GS-12) and one to do time studies (GS-11). Then they said, "How will we know the night watchman is doing his job correctly?" So they created two management positions.  Then they said, "How are these people going to get paid?"So they created a timekeeper position (GS-09) and a payroll officer (GS-11). Then they said, "Who will account for all of these people?" So they created an administrative position and hired three people: an Admin Officer (GM-13), an assistant Admin Officer (GS-12) and a Legal Secretary (GS-08). Then they said, "We have had this organization in operation for one year and we are $22,000 over budget, we must reduce overall costs," so they fired the night watchman. 

Ronald Reagan described the self-licking nature of government’s insatiable appetite this way, “No government ever voluntarily reduces itself in size. Government programs, once launched, never disappear. Actually, a government bureau is the nearest thing to eternal life we'll ever see on this earth!”  

The Era of Big Government is here, and you WILL like it.  And if you don’t, expect a call from the IRS or some other self-licking eternal entity.