Who Is Government by Michael Lewis: Final Thoughts and Key Takeaways
This is the final post in my series on Who Is Government?: The Untold Story of Public Service by Michael Lewis.
Who is government
The Free-Living Bureaucrat: Heather Stone, the FDA, and the Human Cost of Drug Regulation
This is part 10 of my series on Who Is Government?: The Untold Story of Public Service by Michael Lewis.
Let me tell you about a little girl named Alaina Smith, a brain-eating amoeba, and one federal employee who sat between those two things. This chapter hit differently than most in the book.
The Rookie: A Gen-Z Paralegal at the DOJ Who Actually Loves Her Government Job
This is part 9 of my series on Who Is Government?: The Untold Story of Public Service by Michael Lewis.
Most of the chapters in this book are written by journalists profiling strangers. This one is different. W. Kamau Bell, the comedian and TV host, writes about his own goddaughter. Her name is Olivia Rynberg-Going, and she’s a paralegal at the Department of Justice antitrust division. She’s in her early twenties. She loves her job.
The Equalizer: Pamela Wright and the Fight to Make Government Records Belong to Everyone
This is part 8 of my series on Who Is Government?: The Untold Story of Public Service by Michael Lewis.
Here’s something nobody tells you about the National Archives: if you live west of Pittsburgh and east of Guam, chances are the records that document your family’s story are roughly 2,000 miles away from you.
The Cyber Sleuth: How an IRS Agent Took Down Crypto Criminals and Rescued Children
This is part 7 of my series on Who Is Government?: The Untold Story of Public Service by Michael Lewis.
Picture this. It’s early morning in Hamburg, New York. A guy named Jarod Koopman is teaching Brazilian jiu-jitsu. He weighs 180 pounds and he just pinned a 280-pound student to the floor without breaking much of a sweat. Then he changes clothes, drives to an office, sits down at a computer, and spends the day hunting terrorists and child predators through cryptocurrency.
The Number: Why the Consumer Price Index Is Way More Important Than You Think
This is part 6 of my series on Who Is Government?: The Untold Story of Public Service by Michael Lewis.
Most chapters in this book have a person at the center. A scientist, an engineer, a government worker doing something remarkable. This chapter is different. John Lanchester’s essay is about a number. Just one number. And by the end, you’ll understand why that one number matters more than almost anything else the government produces.
The Searchers: NASA Scientists Who Might Find Alien Life in Our Lifetime
This is part 5 of my series on Who Is Government?: The Untold Story of Public Service by Michael Lewis.
Here’s something wild: we are probably going to find evidence of life on another planet within the next 25 years. Not “maybe someday.” Within our lifetimes. And the people doing that work are government scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, working in boring beige buildings near Pasadena, California, spending your tax dollars to answer one of the oldest questions in human history.
The Sentinel: Ronald Walters and the Sacred Work of Honoring America's War Dead
This is part 4 of my series on Who Is Government?: The Untold Story of Public Service by Michael Lewis.
Casey Cep opens this chapter with a story that stops you cold.
The Canary: How a Princeton Kid Became a Coal Miner and Saved Hundreds of Lives
This is part 3 of my series on Who Is Government?: The Untold Story of Public Service by Michael Lewis.
Here’s the thing about bureaucrats: most of us picture someone shuffling papers in a beige office. We don’t picture someone going underground in a West Virginia coal mine to figure out why people keep dying.
Michael Lewis Found a Journalistic Gold Mine Inside the Federal Government
This is part 2 of my series on Who Is Government?: The Untold Story of Public Service by Michael Lewis.
The introduction to this book is Lewis explaining how he stumbled into what he calls a “journalistic gold mine.” And his framing is interesting because he talks about it like a Wall Street trade.
Who Is Government by Michael Lewis: Why This Book About Bureaucrats Is Worth Your Time
I just finished reading Who Is Government?: The Untold Story of Public Service by Michael Lewis, and I want to walk you through it chapter by chapter.