That is veering very close to “deep state” / “the swamp” style nonsense. The Republicans had a trifecta in the first two years of the Trump admin and did pretty much nothing. It’s much easier for them to blame this on the underlying systems than them just being incompetent. Which is closer to the truth
It’s also not a precedent anyone wants setting really because who knows where it ends. Does every new admin just fire everyone from before so there is no knowledge or experience ?
The last point is a very good one. The idea may well be totally impractical.
I don't think the "deep state", "swamp, "blob" stuff is entirely nonsense, although it's almost certainly overstated. If Trump or the Conservatives got into power with clear plans and ideas how to deliver them I doubt they could be stopped. But from what I've read a lot of governments are totally unprepared for the way government actually works, and that's probably the source of some of the wilder ideas. There's a slightly more sinister implication to them but at their heart I'd say the terms "deep state", "blob", "swamp" etc are really just new names for an old idea that was widely accepted for a long time. Just as it's impossible for any news organisation to be truly impartial it's also impossible for civil servants to be truly impartial.
Do you really believe all these people are blank slates with no opinions of their own? Of course they aren't. They're largely educated in the same universities, many on similar courses, so it's not surprising they generally have similar views. I don't know the American system but I know some UK civil servants (as in, people who work at national government level) and I know a lot of people who work in local government. I know what they think about various issues, I know which political party they're more sympathetic to. I remember one of them I used to work with - a woman in her mid-20s at the time - went on a Tinder date one night and told me the next day "I can't believe I got matched with a ****ing Tory boy."
Given that left-wing governments tend to favour bigger government - which means bigger civil service budgets and more staff - and given that universities are becoming more and more left wing, it would be surprising if the civil service
wasn't generally left-leaning. Look at the current government. Sue Gray and Patrick Vallance were supposedly impartial civil servants not long ago and both now work in or for a Labour government. I very much doubt either had some sort of road to Damascus conversion where they suddenly became converted to left-wing thinking. And then you have the welcome Angela Rayner got from her department, that you can see below. Applause. Huge smiles on faces. Impartial? Don't make me laugh.
You must log in or register to see media
The idea of the civil service having an agenda isn't a new one. Yes Minister was first aired over 40 years ago for goodness sake and they say many of the episodes are almost portrayals of real events, with some added comedy. And the set up that show portrays - or something very like it - is also reflected in the diaries/books of politicians like Rory Stewart or Richard Crossman. I suppose you could include things Dominic Cummings has said as well. Hell, I've seen Thomas Sowell talk about his experiences working in the US government in the early 1960s and how the civil service were more concerned with maintaining their departmental budgets than helping people, and I've seen the same things to differing extents in my own career.
