When I was in grade school, Cohen Sr. decided that I was not allowed to say “I don’t know” under any circumstances. After consulting with my sister, we can’t seem to remember how I was supposed to reply when the answer escaped me (“I don’t know Butchie, instead?“), but it’s entirely possible that this rule forced me to know everything about everything in perpetuity.

So it was with a bit of shock that I read that somehow the departed Cohen Sr. is directing policy in Siberia:

The mayor of a Siberian oil town has ordered his bureaucrats to stop using expressions such as “I don’t know” and “I can’t.” Or look for another job.

Alexander Kuzmin, the 33-year-old mayor of Megion, has banned these and 25 other phrases as a way to make his administration more efficient, his spokeswoman said Tuesday.

“It’s a suggestion to the staff that they should think before saying something,” Oksana Shestakova said by telephone. “To say ‘I don’t know’ is the same as admitting your helplessness.”

Sometimes you just have to wait for vindication like this.