Elon Reeve Musk is good at many things, as he has proven during his decades in the public eye.
He’s an ace at seizing upon technologies that wind up running our lives, and he’s also great at giving his kids names that sound more like Wi-Fi passwords. He has also superseded Dave Matthews’s place in pop culture as the pre-eminent goofy-looking South African import. However, his mission to cut wasteful governmental spending has been, thus far, unsuccessful.
One hundred percent of the American population can agree that there is far too much wasteful spending by the federal government, and Musk and his merry band of edgelords who comprise the Department of Grifting Executiv—I mean, the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) claim they have saved our government billions through a rampant series of hacks and slashes to federal programs.
A recent report has shown quite the opposite to be true, however. The federal government is still spending money like a teenager whose parents are away for the weekend and is left a credit card with an impossibly high limit.
An analysis published last week by Reuters states that between Jan. 21 and Feb. 20, the Trump administration spent $710 billion, which is almost a billion dollars more than what Joe Biden spent in the same time period in 2024.
We all want our tax dollars going toward things that actually help run the country more efficiently, but there is a careful, correct way of going about cutting the fat from the bloated government.
The majority of governmental spending in the aforementioned period of reportage has gone toward health and retirement programs, and interest payments, while DOGE has fired more than 30,000 federal workers.
The goal, as stated, by DOGE and the Trump-Musk administration, is to reduce the federal spending deficit by $1 trillion, and the timeline is to accomplish this feat by 2026, but given the most recent spending analysis cited above, that is not possible, and likely more chest-beating by politicians who are best at that sort of thing, as opposed to actually serving We the People.
So many of DOGE’s claims have been revealed as bunk that, reportedly, the department’s website was quietly changed to reflect the truth in such matters. There is not nearly enough space to itemize all of them, but here’s a couple of examples.
DOGE claimed to have cut a contract for ICE for $8 billion. That amount was off by, well, $799.2 million, as reported in the New York Times.
Also of note, one analysis found that hundreds of contracts that the agency claimed to have put the kibosh on had already been finished. Chest-beating, saber-rattling, sure, but zero savings to the taxpayer.
Again, we all want less government waste, so how does DOGE actually achieve its stated goals? For one, how about getting rid of the edgelord neckbeard contingency staffing it and finding some folks who know what they are doing. Prior to the election, Musk mentioned that Dr. Ron Paul could be a part of DOGE, and Dr. Paul expressed interest in joining. That went nowhere, but there you have a perfect disparity represented: Ron Paul is a true patriot and an actual fiscal conservative. The likes of him and the clowns behind DOGE would not mix well, methinks.
Be that as it may, if an agency is devoted to the idea of governmental efficiency, finding people devoted to that lofty, noble cause and the rule of law is where it needs to position itself, insofar as personnel is concerned.
Reportedly, there have been several other hiccups in what DOGE has claimed versus what it actually does. A claimed $232 million cut to the Social Security Administration was actually only for $560K, and three $655 million cuts to the U.S. Agency for International Development were only, actually, a combined $18 million.
These claims, erroneous as they might be, don’t seem to be questioned much by the general populace. Some of those folks fall into the category of those who really don’t care much about what government is doing, but then, there are those who cultishly adore the Trump-Musk administration and refuse to even entertain the idea of holding anyone in said administration’s feet to the grease.
Celebrity, in our culture, seems to afford a certain status where those who attain it are above and beyond reproach.
Again, there is far too much wasteful spending in our government, but instead of appointing the world’s richest manchild and his gang of young turks to shoot first and aim later, President Trump should appoint people who are experts in cutting waste, and doing so carefully, and within the letter of the law. Folks like Ron Paul, if not Dr. Paul, himself, would be great assets to a program like DOGE.
Carefully find the waste and bring it before Congress, and be transparent and accountable to We the People. That is the efficient way of doing things.
