The Doge of DC
Nobody thinks Musk and Ramaswamy can do it.
Ramaswamy: ‘We want to go in and slash and burn that bureaucracy’
This is not Al Gore.
You have two men who have accomplished tremendous things, who are independently wealthy, who loathe bureaucracy viscerally, and who are acting in an organization independent of government.
The bureaucracy doesn’t know yet how scared they should be.
‘“We want to go in and slash and burn that bureaucracy to help Americans, stimulate the economy and to restore self-governance again,” Ramaswamy, a former Republican presidential candidate, told Fox News’s Sean Hannity.
‘“The people we elect to run the government — they’re not even the ones who run the government anymore. It’s these unelected bureaucrats,” he added.
‘On Tuesday, Trump announced Musk and Ramaswamy as the heads of DOGE, which aims to “slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures,” as well as restructure federal agencies.’
DOGE: Examples of federal spending that could be on the chopping block
This is just the low-hanging fruit.
‘Billions to maintain office buildings, many of which are empty as employees work from home.
$6 million for United States Agency for International Development to
boost tourism in Egypt.$400 million of taxpayer dollars for presidential campaigns.
$2.6 million in taxpayer dollars to fund a critical race theory program that trains students to promote CRT.
Millions to train school teachers in DEI.
Hundreds of millions of FEMA dollars for migrants.
Tens of millions per year for DEI at the Pentagon.
Nearly $32 million in COVID funding for luxury cars.
$1.2 million in taxpayer dollars to find evidence that racism is to blame for poor sleep in minority communities.
$28 million for camouflage uniforms that you can see.
Billions in improper payments of COVID funds to businesses.
$100 million for projects in wealthy Manhattan.
$1 million for the West Harlem "Environmental Justice Center."
$50 million via "Environmental Justice" grant to anti-Israel group.
$3 billion overall for "Environmental Justice" grants to groups, many of which are accused of partisanship.
Part of New York's $9 billion in federal COVID funding went to train staff in ‘culturally responsive sustaining instruction’ and ‘privilege’ and to recognize ‘equity warriors.’"
$200,000 spent by the Department of Defense on Starbucks espresso machines
Millions to study COVID "misinformation." ‘
Pulse Poll: Majority of feds putting mission over politics
Nobody wants to quit.
Yet.
‘A Federal News Network “Pulse Poll” found 42% of the more than 1,000 respondents plan on staying in their jobs and another 41% say they are taking a “wait and see” approach before jumping ship. Federal News Network conducted the online survey of its audience from Nov. 6-7.’
How Trump Plans to Purge Thousands of Government Workers
The left is starting to tune into Schedule F. Here is Mother Jones on the case.
This notion that Trump is going to “politicize” the bureaucracy suggests a Land-of-Cats naïve view in which the civil service is populated with experts acting without an agenda.
What’s next, telling people that universities are just academics?
In the words of Austin Powers, “that train has sailed.”
Nobody believes it.
‘Signed in the lead-up to the 2020 election and promptly rescinded by the Biden administration, Schedule F would reassign potentially dozens of thousands of policy-related jobs under a new category, effectively stripping career civil servants from employment protections and making it easier for political appointees to fire them.’
Bureaucracy costs Germany up to 146 billion euros per year, Ifo says
The headline is misleading compared to the statement. If excessive bureaucracy costs this much, how much does mainline bureaucracy cost?
As we’ve been saying, things must be colossally bad in Germany for them to have reached this point.
I suspect that the people of Greece who suffered through years of Teutonic austerity after the Global Financial Crisis have little sympathy.
‘Excessive bureaucracy costs Germany up to 146 billion euros ($153.53 billion) a year in lost economic output, a study by the Ifo Institute showed on Thursday, putting a hard figure on the impact of a long term bugbear for businesses.’
Biden Pushed ‘Equity’ Deep into the Foundation of Government. Here’s How Trump Can Uproot It
Equity is the notion of equality of outcome, where neither equality nor outcome are defined terms. It is a presumptive authority to direct the machinery, to twist the knobs of the machine, until things look the way someone in power wants them to look.
It is not something entrenched in the constitution or the cultural history of the country. That’s the whole point of it.
It is a foreign body. Political will is the prednisone that keeps this transplant from falling.
The United States is about to go cold turkey.
The question is, did the organ transplant have time to get integrated, with broader consequences for its rejection, or will it be straightforward with little collateral damage.
‘But dismantling the federal government’s massive DEI bureaucracy, which has ballooned under the direction of President Joe Biden, and rooting out illiberal and unconstitutional racial preferences the Left has deeply embedded into the government and into law will be a yearslong effort, conservative civil-rights lawyers and activists told National Review.
‘“This is not a short-term project,” said Dan Morenoff, executive director of the American Civil Rights Project, which specializes in fighting identity-based discrimination.’
18 States Sue SEC, Gensler, Commissioners in Unprecedented Crypto Regulation Battle
There is a point in the football game or whatever where the momentum turns.
Suddenly, the cornerback intercepts the ball on his two yard line and runs it all the way back for a touchdown that brings his underdog team within two points of defeating their ranked opponent.
You can feel it.
Indiana football coach Curt “Google Me” Cignetti calls it breaking the opponent’s will. They know. You know. They know that you know. It can happen in a single play.
The election has changed a lot of things.
‘Central to the complaint is the claim that the SEC’s enforcement actions against cryptocurrency companies inhibit growth in a rapidly expanding economic sector and infringe upon states’ rights to oversee their own economies. The states argue that Gensler’s interpretation of most cryptocurrencies, aside from bitcoin and ether, as securities represents an overreach, stifling innovation and disregarding state-level consumer protections and economic regulation.
‘Gensler has asserted that the majority of digital assets fall within the SEC’s regulatory scope. However, industry proponents, several lawmakers, and many states argue that certain cryptocurrencies should be classified as commodities, placing them under the oversight of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) rather than the SEC. This regulatory ambiguity, plaintiffs argue, has led to a “regulatory void” that has hindered the industry, as the SEC imposes penalties without an established framework, allegedly curbing industry expansion.’
What’s Coming in Consumer Finance Regulation & Enforcement?
We’ll see what the lame duck session brings.
But the promise of a reduction in arbitrary use of the regulator’s rulemaking pen, with one eye on their new Congressional overlords, is positive.
‘‘The appetite for “lame duck” rulemaking will vary by agency. Agencies will balance the desire to advance final Biden administration initiatives before the inauguration with the risk of having new rulemaking rescinded through the Congressional Review Act or other mechanisms available to the incoming administration. The CFPB has the potential to be aggressive and push out several high-profile rules, including the larger participant rule for nonbank payments providers, the overdraft rule and the FCRA medical debt rule. Meanwhile, there are indications that the Fed might be more inclined to take a “wait and see” approach on Reg II and capital requirements.
Biden-era rules won’t just go away, but informal rulemaking might. Rescinding or revising informal agency guidance – such as advisory opinions, interpretive rules, and other policy statements – can be done with the stroke of a pen. Rules that have gone through the formal notice-and-comment process are more durable. GOP control of both houses of Congress gives the Trump administration a number of ways to roll back existing regulations, but the initial focus will likely be on quickly addressing informal guidance.’