I don't mind them working with congress and the cabinet secretaries to shrink government. That's how it works!

What I do mind, personally, is them illegally (as in, prohibited by current laws and regulations) dismissing as many people as they can without cause and without recourse to the correct labor review boards, etc that have been in place for decades.

There is some waste in the federal government, absolutely, but most jobs are underpaid compared to the market and worked by folks that want to do good work.

Waste can absolutely be found and cut and deprioritized, but the programs that they've started cutting with a chainsaw are small dollar programs that are trying to move things forward in many cases, or keep basic systems from going off the rails.

You want to go after government you evaluate and then cut and then make sure the congressional budget also cuts the funding.

Problem is - Congress likes these programs and they can't pass a budget to save their lives. They're good for their districts so they will make you spend the money through the law.

You have to work through the process - the way they're doing it is lazy because they're taking shortcuts instead of doing it right. White House, Congress, AND a number of court justices and they still don't have the will to do it the legal way with appropriate checks and balances. Shameful.

Who would you fire if they did things that support you throughout your day? Who would you fire if there was no backup plan? Who would you fire without even looking at their role OR their performance?

In order to address the deficit, cutting federal workers won't be enough. You have to make major cuts to social security, Medicare, and Medicaid or raise revenues (likely both) to balance the budget. None of that is popular though and anyone proposing that and running for office will get booed off the stage. You can cut the entirety of DOD and it'll cover only 1/3rd the current deficit.

Along with tackling the politically hard things, you have to start addressing poor contract performance (not all of which is technically fraud, waste, or abuse but certainly some would fall under those categories). DOD wastes billions a year on contracts that won't deliver or may deliver but less than promised, late, and/or overbudget.

In general, people often borrow money to spend on capital improvements, with the goal that those improvements will generate more money than the cost of debt plus interest. Businesses do this all the time, and they don't have the ability to print money.

But if you care about this you cannot honestly argue for tax cuts. You should be arguing for a broad-based increase in taxes. But that's politically unpopular and tax cuts are popular.

Raise taxes. That will do plenty to address the deficit. Instead, tax rates are in motion to decrease, making the debt problem significantly worse.

I offer up that we collect unpaid taxes ($250B). Then we increase the highest tax bracket to 90%. Then we get a progressive capital gains tax. That should pay out trillions.

>You guys have offered nothing to address deficit spending

the Republican-controlled Congress passed an increase in the spending limit. DOGE isn't cutting costs -- they can't! That's Congress's job! All DOGE can do is shuffle around the funding, and even then, they only have the authority to do that a certain amount.

Congress mandated that the Executive spend $X Y ways. DOGE does not have control over _EITHER_ the amount OR the ways.

I am sympathetic with financial conservatives who want to shore up the budget but it would be nice if they would actually do that -- it would be an act of Congress, not the Executive.

Anything the Executive does about spending -- besides proposing budget changes to Congress -- is performative at best and downright illegal at worst.