There are a lot of really complex, systemic factors that can help explain why the government has gotten to where it is. I'll just note that on my project, I work with a lot of really awesome contractors every day.
That's totally fair; I've done minimal work around government, and I don't claim to be an expert on this at all. I just know that successful contractors are rewarded disproportionately for their ability to navigate bureaucracy. Also, that was especially the case with healthcare.gov.
On the flipside, I'm not sure how much this vouch counts, considering you previously worked on the WP core and it takes a long time for the WP core to change anything (e.g. the minimum PHP version). Maybe your standards for "slow bureaucracy" and others' are different?
