It's the contractors' fault, too. Both parties are playing the same game, here: corporate welfare for the contractors, who usually are owned or operated by people with connections to the government, and long-term job security for the government project management officials who oversee these things.

I don't know if you've ever worked for a contractor, but I have, and I guarantee you the same responsibility shuffling, profile munging, least-amount-of-work attitude exists there. Without it, these contractors wouldn't be able to keep feeding at the trough with the rest of their corporate welfare recipient friends (while they bitch to each other about how evil liberals are, how disgusting entitlements are, etc.).