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But the democrat appointed heads had all the power?

The problem with a persistent bureaucracy is that it selects for bureaucrats in favor of perpetuating and expanding the bureaucracy.

So a political appointee who wants to expand government finds willing allies.

An appointee who wants to reduce government finds opposition.

The association of individual political parties with those positions is more variable.

The American federal government has more or less the same number of employees as it did in the 1970s.

Yes, if you only count "federal government employees" https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/CES9091000001

But this neglects the millions of contractors and other positions that are also funded by government spending, which is harder to measure, and does change more over time.

https://www.brookings.edu/articles/the-true-size-of-governme... (2020, but the article doesn't clarify if the 5m includes short-term census workers)

It’s a lot harder to argue that those contractors form the bulk of the “democrat installed permanent bureaucracy that ACTUALLY run the government.”

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