Why Don't You Just Tell Me What Movie You Want to See?
When you're in a hole, stop digging.
Why would we keep the bureaucracy that has failed our students?
What if we just gave education grants to the states without any conditions and let them make things happen?
‘Let me be clear: This legislation does not cut even a dollar of education funding. Federal dollars for education will continue by flowing directly to states in the form of block grants, except for those specifically identified programs noted above, which will remain under federal agencies. This rids schools of the administrative strings of Washington. By eliminating unnecessary overhead costs, we could save approximately $2.2 billion annually — savings that could either be redirected to classrooms or used to reduce the deficit. This bill would allow states and school districts to decide what works best for their students.’
White House Announces End of ‘Biden’s Dumb War on Things That Work’
Imagine writing 13,000 words on showerhead regulation.
‘President Trump’s order to repeal 13,000 words of federally imposed frustration will “make America’s showers great again” according to the White House, which announces:
‘Under Obama and Biden, the government issued lengthy rules… redefining “showerhead” as a “nozzle” and making multi-nozzle showers illegal if they collectively discharged over 2.5 gallons of water per minute.
‘These changes served a radical green agenda that made life worse for everyday Americans. President Trump sought to undo this definition in his first term by publishing extensive analysis and a formal rule—however, Biden undid this progress and the shower wars continued.
‘No market failure justifies this intrusion: Americans pay for their own water and should be free to choose their showerheads without federal meddling.’
The NYC Department of Investigation is one of the most prestigious and competent agencies in a massive government.
Now it’s suffering.
‘NYC’s government has been rocked by corruption scandals at a pace not seen in nearly a century. Yet over the past few years, NY leaders have presided over a gradual weakening of the city’s No. 1 corruption-fighting agency, the Department of Investigation:’
Hours in Line, Cut-Off Calls: Accessing Social Security in the Era of DOGE
The problem with cutting staff at some of these agencies is that the technology infrastructure and the processes are too weak.
‘Such scenes have become more common at about 1,200 Social Security field offices across the nation, where employees, beneficiaries and advocacy groups describe a depleted, overburdened staff, long waits and frequent disconnections from the agency’s toll-free number, and hours spent idling in field offices. Social Security has become a central focus of President Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency, with Elon Musk referring to it as a “Ponzi scheme” and pressing for dramatic changes.
‘The Social Security Administration is cutting staff, restricting what recipients can do over the phone and closing some local field offices that help people in person. The agency is reducing its workforce from 57,000 employees to about 50,000, the lowest level in decades. These changes are coming as the number of retirees claiming benefits has risen in recent years as baby boomers age.’
Deloitte hit hardest by Trump’s clampdown on consultancy spending
Government systems can’t figure out how to collate the data on contracts they have with consultants, so the GSA asks the consultants to self-report.
Ironically, the consultants think that the slides the GSA used look amateurish.
Allrighty then.
‘The firms have also been told to set out how much of their work is billed by the hour and how much is on fixed price or performance-based contracts. The GSA had been frustrated, the senior official said, that such data was not readily accessible from within government, given fragmented IT systems and databases.
‘One of the GSA’s aims is to encourage a shift to performance-based contracts, the official added.
‘At some consulting firms, the exercise has caused consternation at what some see as a lack of precision in the definition of consulting, lumping together strategic advisory work — which can be derided as analysts coming up with PowerPoints — with giant IT implementation and support projects. Some executives also pointed out the irony of a client asking its own suppliers what work to cut.
’ “Speaking as a consultant, this is the anthesis of how you are supposed to do this,” said a director at one targeted firm. The GSA’s template slide deck “looks like a high-schooler put it together”, they added.’
A Bill to Stop Nationwide Injunctions
The separation of powers is a thing. Or, at least, it used to be.
‘The obvious solution is to limit district courts to resolving the cases only between the parties before them. If the Supreme Court won’t act to rein in the lower courts, Congress must. Article III, Section 1 of the Constitution authorizes Congress to create and organize federal courts. On Monday I will introduce the Judicial Relief Clarification Act to restore the constitutional role of lower courts by restraining their ability to issue universal injunctions. Under my bill, lower courts could no longer block legitimate executive action by issuing orders to nonparties to the lawsuit. The bill would also make TROs against the government immediately appealable, to make sure that prudence wins out over rash decisions handed down in the heat of a political moment.’
Incompetence and inefficiency are the legacy of bureaucracy.
‘I spoke to Mr. Gilder last week for an update. He’s a big fan of time prices, “the one impeachable standard to compare abundance from one era to another era. How many hours does it take a typical worker to earn a set of goods and services?” It turns out that “all goods and services from the private sector are radically cheaper in time prices, while government services are the one function that has actually increased in cost in most cases.” Why am I not surprised?’
Long After the Pandemic, Medicaid’s Crisis Persists
People respond to incentives. Here, the incentive was to move from private insurance to public insurance.
The welfare state increases.
‘As a result, expanded Medicaid has crowded out private insurance options. A 2007 study co-authored by Jonathan Gruber, one of the law’s architects, found that coverage expansions had crowd-out rates of roughly 60%. A 2008 analysis by the Kaiser Family Foundation found that, even among households of modest means with incomes between one and two times the poverty level, 44% had private coverage, suggesting that Medicaid expansion would erode existing sources of insurance.
‘Nearly six years ago, I wrote in these pages how one state’s Medicaid expansion caused thousands of people to drop their private plans. Data from the Louisiana Department of Health showed that between 3,000 and 5,000 people a month dropped their private coverage during the initial months of the state’s Medicaid expansion. The numbers suggested that roughly a third of Medicaid enrollees had left their private coverage to join the government rolls.’
Incompetence?
‘DOGE’s Antonio Gracias Says Massive Numbers of Illegal Migrants Who Received SSN’s Are on Taxpayer Funded Benefits “Every benefit program we looked at was being accessed by these people. 1.3 million of them are on Medicaid right now, today. And by the way, it's just ramping. It's just starting … They found hard hits in the target center of very bad people, criminals and people on terrorist watch lists, that are in this group.”’
Mark Cuban has opinions.
‘Mark Cuban: "In this generation the laws that have been passed and even the laws that we're passing now become outdated in minutes. A law that seems smart to protect the environment in the 60's that's now holding back the rail in California, or building homes for people." 'Democrats are too focused on process and regulation and it's at the expense of actual results'’
Audit: Cuomo Spent $453M On 247,343 Medical Devices For COVID... State Used Only 3
Awkward.
‘Former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo's handling of the Covid crisis wasn't just a health catastrophe, but a financial one too, according to a damning new audit report released Friday. The state government poured $453 million into building an enormous stockpile of medical equipment -- and only used 0.000012% of it.
‘According to state comptroller Tom DiNapoli, New York bought a staggering 247,343 medical devices, but only wound up using a laughable three pieces of equipment out of the vast horde. Worse, the waste was only compounded by the state's utter neglect of its fiduciary duties to taxpayers. Rather than finding buyers for the once-valuable assets, bureaucrats have been content to let the equipment age and decay in warehouses. As if the erosion of the stockpiles weren't bad enough, New York is also wasting money on storage costs. ‘