Inside Musk's Aggressive Incursion into the Federal Government
nytimes.com
nytimes.com
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> Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) told NOTUS that even though what Elon Musk is doing is unconstitutional — “nobody should bellyache about that.” > He added: “That runs afoul of the Constitution in the strictest sense. But it’s not uncommon for presidents to flex a little bit on where they can spend and where they can stop spending.”
https://politicalwire.com/2025/02/04/thom-tillis-says-nobody...
Im not understanding how this will help Americans, their jobs, livelihoods and the economy? Not trying to be political just confused by elect me and America will be more prosperous. How will it when the worry of AI taking jobs is right here at our feet, being done so at the federal level and being expedited by a guy who has more money then whatever.
I think the key is that parts of America will be more prosperous. For example, the already-prosperous.
Tell me, was this worth it to own the libs? I want to yell at you MAGA folks but I don’t want to get banned here, so I’m being as nice as possible but I really hate you guys right now.
Edit: instead of pressing downvote why don’t you cowards speak?
Reading your comment, I just felt very sad. It's like you lived a reverse American dream.
I feel sorry for you. Feeling powerless it's a shitty feeling, especially if you have done everything right
What I wish is that the Democrats had heard the plea of so many working class Americans, who were basically saying the same thing as you. "Your policies, (like mass immigration), make me fearful for the future, and I don't know how I will survive, or thrive". It was the dismissal of their fears, often with derision and insults, that pushed so many of them into the arms of Trump.
Remember when he bought twitter and gutted it? Child safty department was cut to the bone and they barely got away without any legal issues. Numerous core services failed leaving twitter/x barely operating for days. And this was with the tenured professionals keeping things running, now he seems to be using a bunch of people with under 5 years experience in the work force let alone in these sectors/technology.
And at the risk of being that guy on the internet, one of the things that could be beneficial is making sure you have all of your documentation in order to prove that Medicaid for you and your family should not be interrupted. I'm 99.9% sure that Medicaid is not going anywhere, but I do think there is going to be a tremendous amount of scrutiny on enrollment and aggressive attempts to cut costs. Fair or not, the people who are organized, and can show proof of their situation, are going to be in a better position to argue their case than those who are incapable of getting organized. That includes making sure you download any statements or info from government websites because it's possible (likely?) some of those may go offline.
For other folks reading this, I'm making no political statement here. I'm taking the parent at face value, expressing sympathy and trying to be as helpful as an internet commenter can be (of course that's not very helpful).
I guess my anger and rage is also because not only is my family dependent on Medicaid but most of the families I know at my kid’s therapy center are on it. I am not just being personally affected but this affects so many in my community locally and as autism affected families. It’s enraging that the SV break things fast approach is being used for something that affects tens of millions of people and who rely on it for their literal lives in most cases, and some folks here are cheering it on!
As the deadline for the current tax breaks draws near, there is increasing urgency around the administration push to extend and potentially expand these benefits, particularly for billionaires ;-)
Despite having the political upper hand through control of both the House and the Senate, there is a significant obstacle: The massive federal deficit.
To make these tax cuts feasible, the administration would need to offset the cost by cutting government spending. Unfortunately, much of that spending goes toward social programs, meaning millions of Americans who rely on government support could be adversely affected.
It's a shame the needed tax raises are not in discussion.
When a country bets itself on a bold gamble, with enormous upside but also enormous downside, if the gamble doesn't pay off, the worst thing that happens is that the country fails, institutions break down, conflict and violence erupt everywhere, entire populations suffer, and no one has a way out.
Like it or not, the US is going to bet itself on a bold gamble. Bureaucrats, lawmakers, and the courts move too slowly to be able to do anything about it. Indeed, it's already happening. As someone quoted in the OP explains: "Before Congress and the courts can respond, Elon Musk will have rolled up the whole government."
* healthy people are able to work and pay taxes
* when people don’t have access to regular care, they end up in the ER when things get really bad. All the rest of us pay the cost of those visits
* access to care (particularly vaccines like flu or covid) means less spread of disease and leas exposure to disease for the rest of us
The reasoning musk provides may be untruthful, but it's incredibly persuasive to a winning segment of voters. These articles are meant to be alarm bells, but they end up as delightful entertainment.
https://www.reddit.com/r/NFA/comments/n4dpm7/the_atf_outlawe...
https://ideatransfuser.wordpress.com/2013/04/25/from-lobster...
https://fourwheelinsider.com/toyota-hilux-united-states/
You can't possibly be unaware of the Waco mass killing if you are confusing the US electorate with the general public.
On Waco: I do not see how this fits in with the others.
I am not able to rightly apprehend what sort of confusion of ideas could give voice to such an utterance.
You linked the shoelace restriction. That seems like an obvious example of "silly/stupid".
By collateral, death. Most regulations are written in blood. Tearing out a bunch of Chesterton fence regulations will result in death.
The end result was none of the apocalyptic predictions. People build whatever housing they can afford rather than buying more housing safety at the expense of less healthcare and food, education etc. When we deregulated, people made their own safety calculus and it worked. And it's why I have a home.
If you don't want this info on the internet, would you please send it to my email?
hruvulum@gmail.com
Like y'all know that is not normal.
> Sixty-five percent of Americans say government efficiency is an issue, but few said they supported DOGE, and fewer than half of those polled support the department’s head. Fifty-two percent of Americans, asked ahead of the Jan. 20 inauguration, had an unfavorable view of Musk, while 36% had a favorable view of him, according to the AP-NORC poll released on Jan. 24. And just 29% of Americans said they approved of the creation of DOGE.
> On government inefficiency, 81% of Republicans identified it as a major issue. However, only 58% of Republicans said they supported DOGE. With Democrats, 55% saw government inefficiency as a problem, but only 11% are in favor of DOGE. Those numbers are 61% and 20%, respectively, with independents. Six in 10 respondents went on to say they disapprove of billionaires advising the president. Just 20% of Republicans said they thought policy advice from billionaires was a good thing, while 44% did not find the idea to be positive or negative, the poll found.
Ignorance is bliss. Or at least it is until your child grows a third arm, and you spend an hour a day boiling your water for safety.
“We spent the weekend feeding USAID into the wood chipper,” Mr. Musk gloated on X at 1:54 a.m. Monday. “Could gone to some great parties. Did that instead.”
This is called Impoundment, and is illegal. Just ask Nixon.
The Executive branch is actually required to spend as dictated by Congress. There is a portion of spending that is discretionary, but it's a small minority of the Federal budget, and does not include the things currently being targeted.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impoundment_of_appropriated_...
This is the problem I have with all of the commentary on DOGE, it's extremely slippery about what is being paid for by whom and how. The official website for 18F says they are not allocated funding by Congress: https://18f.gsa.gov/about/
AFAIK, neither 18F nor Direct File were established by statute, both were set up by executive action within existing legal authority. It's not clear to me that terminating either as functions at executive discretion is illegal.