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Notes -
I've said this before, but I have to reiterate: applying the logic of business to government is a mistake. The difference is not that governments don't care about waste and private businesses do; there's significant political incentive to crack down on (perceived) waste. Rather, governments and businesses are not subject to the same feedback mechanisms.
The first and biggest distinction is that governments cannot (except in truly extreme circumstances) fail. Firms which make subpar decisions (I won't say 'bad', because you only need to outrun the bear) will eventually go out of business as you're outcompeted and profit/credit/investments dry up. Governments can keep spending money forever because revenue derives from taxes, not sales, and they are (usually) not trying to make a profit. You can't count on "what's really needed" emerging because your feedback mechanism doesn't respond like that. You can just break something important and never fix it.
The other big distinction is scope of interest. Businesses usually represent a narrow group of people (shareholders) with fairly straightforward interests (money). Governments not only aren't trying to make money, they represent the interests of countless vying groups. There's a great deal of disagreement on the margins about what they ought to be doing and how. You're going to get contradictory feedback on almost anything you do. One man's waste is another man's critical program.
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