Tag Archives: Department of Government Efficiency

Diary of the Second Addams Administration.

Posted on by
Reply

            Is the bureaucracy of the Executive Branch of the government of the United States lean, agile, innovative, and filled with able idealists?  Or is it bloated, hide-bound, unwieldy, and ill-suited to the needs of the new century?  It’s a fair question to ask. 

President Donald Trump and Court Wizard Elon Musk appear to believe that it is the latter, rather than the former.  For Trump, there seems to be the added flaw in the bureaucracy’s hostility to him during his first term.  He may well want “revenge” both for their past hostility and to prevent anticipated resistance in his second term.  For his part, Musk portrayed himself as battling an “unelected bureaucracy” in order to “restore the will of the people.” 

Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has taken on the task of reducing the federal workforce.[1]  In mid-February 2025, DOGE began firing people in big chunks and very rapidly.  In addition to the thousands of US AID workers on the chopping block, the Department of Agriculture took a heavy hit: 4,000 at the Department and a further 3,400 at its subordinate National Forest Service.  Health and Human Services lost 5,200; the Energy Department lost 2,000; and the Department of Veterans Affairs lost 1,000.[2]  Within these departments, some areas were hit particularly hard: the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of Health, the Food and Drug Administration, and the National Nuclear Security Administration.  More lay-offs took place at the Federal Aviation Agency and the National Park Service.[3]  All this is alarming to terrifying. 

At the same time, and with murky intent, DOGE went after the vast troves of data on ordinary Americans held by the federal government in the data centers of the Social Security Administration, the Internal Revenue Service, the Treasury, and other agencies.[4] 

In his first term, Trump caught a lot of criticism for treating China as a real danger by plastering it with tariffs, trying to build a wall at the southern border to resist massive illegal immigration, and denigrating our NATO allies.  Then Joe Biden kept the tariffs, Russia’s attack on Ukraine revealed that the European allies have been pacifists for decades, and the failure to resist illegal immigration helped cost the Democrats the 2024 election.  Now, some Democrats are admitting that a problem exists, even while they drag on Trump’s coat-tails.  One journalist at the Washington Post accepted that problems did exist with the federal bureaucracy, but objected to indiscriminate mass firing.  On the other hand, others stuck to their last, claiming that the firings were part of “a coup.”  Competent civil servants would be driven out to make space for incompetent Trump loyalists.  That argument is hard to refute when Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Kash Patel, and Peter Hegseth can be offered as evidence. 

Two questions arise.  One, is Trump just trying to scare the bureaucracy into compliance?  Two, how can a log-jammed legislature reform and reduce a behemoth? 

[1] “Trump makes mass layoffs across government,” The Week, 28 February 2025, p. 4. 

[2] Currently, the federal government employs about 2.1 million civilians and about 600,000 military personnel. 

[3] For context, the Department of Agriculture which includes the National Forest Service, employed 93,000 people at the end of the Biden administration, so the cuts amount to about 7.5 percent of the workforce; Health and Human Services employed about 83,000 people, so the cuts amount to about 6 percent of the workforce; The Department of Energy employed 14,000 civilians and 93,000 contractors, so the cuts amounted to 14 percent of the civilian workforce; and the Department of Veteran Affairs employed over 400,000 people, so the cuts are microscopic. 

[4] Why do they need such information?  They aren’t saying.  Why not?  They’re up to something. 

Diary of the Second Addams Administration 2.

Posted on by
1

            Between 20 January and 1 February 2025, President Donald Trump issues 45 Executive Orders (Eos) that imposed sweeping changes in government policies.[1]  President Joe Biden had issued only 26 EOs ordering sweeping changes in the same period following his inauguration and didn’t hit the 45 mark until 14 May 2021.[2] 

            Some of these EOs struck a nerve with Democrats.  Among many other things, Trump withdrew–more accurately re-withdrew–the United States from the Paris Climate executive agreement[3]; ordered the immediate dismantling of any and all government programs promoting diversity, inclusion, and equity; ordered any federal workers employed on such programs to be placed on paid leave; reversed a Biden EO permitting transgender troops to serve in the military; changed the name of the tallest mountain in the United States from “Denali” back to “McKinley”[4]; ordered that the “Gulf of Mexico” be renamed the “Gulf of America”; and reversed an EO originally issued by Lyndon B. Johnson in 1965 which allowed government to lean on private contractors to take “affirmative action” in hiring.[5]  In short, a bunch of sacred cows went to Bovine University. 

            More substantively, Trump withdrew the United States from the World Health Organization, (W.H.O.); said that the United States would “take back” the Panama Canal; reduced restrictions on oil and gas production that had been imposed by the Biden administration; created a “Department of Government Efficiency” (D.O.G.E.) to be led by Elon Musk; and ordered an end to “birthright citizenship.”[6] 

            More orders followed hard on the heels of the first few days.  He issued, then quickly rescinded, an order temporarily halting the payment of federal grants, loans, and other forms of assistance to a wide range of groups outside the federal government.  “The order sparked chaos at universities, charities, local government, and other bodies reliant on federal funding,…”[7]  Not satisfied with shaking hearts and minds with such dramatic action, the administration also issued a warning to federal employees that there were going to be big job cuts.  The e-mail message offered many of them the choice between retiring immediately and being paid for eight months or risking being laid off when Musk got around to them.  “Which will you have?”[8] 

            To top off the disruption, Trump fulfilled his pledge to pardon the 1,600 convicted rioters from 6 January 2021.  Or, in the words of the WSJ, “Cop Beaters.”  He’s good for his word, alas. 

[1] List of executive orders in the second presidency of Donald Trump – Wikipedia 

[2] List of executive actions by Joe Biden – Wikipedia  Biden issued his final EO, his 162nd, on 19 January 2025. 

[3] Like the Iran agreement, President Barack Obama had known that he couldn’t get a treaty through the Senate because the Constitution requires a two-thirds vote of approval for any treaty.  So, in both cases, he settled for executive agreements whose durability depended upon retaining control of the White House.

[4] Still, if you go to a GMC dealer, you won’t be offered a test drive in the “exciting new McKinley.” 

[5] Commonly believed to mean quotas. 

[6] He did not exactly end “birthright citizenship.”  He restricted it to exclude children born of parents who were illegal immigrants, and to exclude children born to a foreign national mother in the United States on any kind of short-term or temporary visa and whose father was also not a citizen.  Furthermore, the change was not retroactive and applies to children born after 19 February 2025.  The 14th Amendment had been adopted long before there had been any idea of illegal immigration. 

[7] “Trump orders cause whiplash in Washington,” The Week, 7 February 2025, p. 4.  See also: “Trump returns with a barrage of orders, pardons,” The Week, 31 January 2025, p. 4. 

[8] True Grit (2010) “Fill Your Hands!” 

Ruthless.

Posted on by
2

            Here’s the rot at the heart of the Republic: American voters of both parties have come to love “free stuff.”[1]  In a Democracy, politicians and political parties see the road to their own success running through giving voters what they want.  For Democrats, it means Tax-Spend-Elect; for Republicans it means Tax Cut-Spend-Elect. 

            As a result, in 2023, federal spending hit $6.75 trillion, with the federal deficit (not debt, just one year’s worth of spending above revenue) hitting $1.8 trillion.[2]  That deficit is 6.4 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP).  That isn’t a record.  It has been surpassed before.  However, those other peaks occurred during some kind of emergency: wars, recessions, etc.  Those conditions don’t apply at the moment. 

“Goo-goos” hate this trait.[3]  In the present day, all sorts of experts and commissions offer warnings of coming catastrophe and plans to avoid same.  The trouble is that this is like trying to talk a drunk into giving sobriety a spin.  It isn’t going to happen until they “hit bottom” or have a “moment of clarity.”[4]  What might bring on such a change? 

            Can you cut federal spending by shrinking the federal government?  YES!  And this idea is supported by a majority of Americans.[5]  Can you cut a LOT of federal spending simply by shrinking the number of civil service employees?  NO! 

First, the cost of salaries for all civil servants runs in the area of $200-$250 billion a year.  You will recall (from just above) that this year’s deficit is $1.8 trillion.  So, $200-$250 billion is about one-eighth of the deficit. 

Second, there’s interest on the debt at $882 billion.  An actual default, not just cuts to existing spending, may be coming.  We’re not there yet and we may be able to fend it off. 

Then there’s “discretionary” spending.  This includes the defense budget and everything else.  This comes in at around $2 trillion.  You can cut the defense budget a bunch.  You just have to believe that we are entering an era of peace and tranquility in which no other country will seek to challenge American interests. 

            Third, there’s the elephant in the room: “mandatory” spending on Social Security, Medicare/Medicaid, and related programs.  This amounts to $4.1 trillion, more than double “discretionary” spending.  “So taming mandatory spending means reining in benefits.”  Ouch! 

            It seems impossible for either Congress or the American people in their present state of desiring “free stuff” from the government to address this issue.  Nor will they raise taxes. 

However, there is scope for executive action.  For example, one “Goo-goo” estimate suggests that as much as $1.4 trillion could be saved by reversing Biden administration executive actions.  All we need is a ruthless lame-duck president who doesn’t care about established traditions or Beltway verities or even what he may have promised to get elected. 

[1] This has become a cultural force.  How and why this has happened is worth exploring. 

[2] Greg Ip, “Cutting Deficits Is Easy—Just Unpopular,” WSJ, 27 December 2024. 

[3] See: Goo-goos – Wikipedia 

[4] You might think that the recent unpleasantness with inflation fueled by deficits would have awakened ordinary Americans to this issue.  It doesn’t seem to have done the trick.  Or perhaps the pre-existing interest groups and political habits were just too strong for a not-yet-crystalized change of attitude.   

[5] According to an Ipsos poll, 57 percent of Americans favor downsizing the federal government.  “Poll Watch,” The Week, 6 December 2024, p. 17.