Trump / Musk (other than DOGE)

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ZenMode said:
I've worked at a large company since 2008 and have gone through at least 3 significant downsizes. That's the cycle. We add people at all levels and we spend money and then we realize that there are too many managers, too many support people in specific jobs, too many unused tools, underutilized buildings we're paying for, etc and then we downsize. Then the cycle starts over again.
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Interesting, Do you think that means that your company is rife with fraud and waste? Because that's the logic you're applying to the government.

I mean you've been there since 2008 and the company keeps having these problems - do you think that means you need to be fired? That's the logic Trump and Elon are applying to the thousands of government employees they're summarily firing for no reason at all.
 
rodoheel said:
So it's just a coincidence that Republicans consistently give the biggest tax cuts to the rich?

But in any event, Republicans have been advocating tax cuts in general for the past 45 years; we've cut taxes; and the lower and middle classes aren't prosperous. There is no more basis for believing that tax cuts create prosperity than for believing that the tooth fairy is real.
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There's more to an economy than just taxes. You can't oversimplify it like you just did. Whether the "rich" is getting a tax cut is irrelevant considering the top earners are paying over 90% of the tax burden. The US has one of the highest corporations taxes. So cutting "rich" peoples taxes isn't really happening like you think it is. This has been debunked constantly. Democrat ran cities are struggling even you can't defend that garbage.
 
rodoheel said:
Interesting that you would quote from the inspector general's recommendations when the Trump admin has just summarily fired numerous inspectors general. Why do you think an administration that claims to want less fraud and more efficiency is firing the government officials who are responsible for investigating fraud and inefficiency? Could it be...that Trump and Musk are not really being honest about their motives? The same people who in only a month have repeatedly lied about the "fraud" and "waste" they are supposedly uncovering? Surely not.

Also did you miss the part where the IG's recommendation to purchase new software to address over- and under-payments was not implemented "because it was not funded"? How do you expect DOGE is going to solve this particular problem? By randomly firing people?
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Only 8 were fired and none at the social security administration
 
rodoheel said:
Interesting that you would quote from the inspector general's recommendations when the Trump admin has just summarily fired numerous inspectors general. Why do you think an administration that claims to want less fraud and more efficiency is firing the government officials who are responsible for investigating fraud and inefficiency? Could it be...that Trump and Musk are not really being honest about their motives? The same people who in only a month have repeatedly lied about the "fraud" and "waste" they are supposedly uncovering? Surely not.

Also did you miss the part where the IG's recommendation to purchase new software to address over- and under-payments was not implemented "because it was not funded"? How do you expect DOGE is going to solve this particular problem? By randomly firing people?
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Again, defending the status quo and ignoring the decades of incompetence because of your hatred towards one man
 
WaynetheDrain said:
First of all, that’s not a website for Doge. It’s a link to follow Doge on X.

But let’s roll with it.

So, perusing the Website, here is a post from Musk discussing all the Social Security recipients who are dead. Then he provides as proof an Excel document with random numbers attached, posting about death fields being set to false, with no explanation of what he’s actually talking about.

Does this seem transparent to you?



IMG_2637.jpeg
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That is probably true but what dogood fails to comprehend is that none of that proves any fraud. It is just that they can't account for how those people died.

As I have pointed out, when they did the study in 2015, of the 6.6 million over 112 with the death field set to false , only ***** 13 ***** were receiving any benefits. I am sure they investigated those 13.

Musk is implying that all of these people are getting some type of check. We have known since 2015 that that is false.
 
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Silence Dogood said:
There's more to an economy than just taxes. You can't oversimplify it like you just did. Whether the "rich" is getting a tax cut is irrelevant considering the top earners are paying over 90% of the tax burden. The US has one of the highest corporations taxes. So cutting "rich" peoples taxes isn't really happening like you think it is. This has been debunked constantly. Democrat ran cities are struggling even you can't defend that garbage.
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But you were talking about taxes. What are you talking about now?

90% of the tax burden? Talk about debunked. The top 1% pay about 25% of taxes. 90% of the tax burden is paid by . . . the top 55-60% or so.

itep.org

Who Pays Taxes in America in 2024

America's tax system is just barely progressive, and not nearly as progressive as many suggest or as progressive as it could be. There is plenty of room for lawmakers to improve the progressivity of the tax code to combat economic, wealth, and racial inequality.
itep.org itep.org

As for the cities "struggling," don't you think it's odd that the people most convinced of this are also the people who don't live in cities? Or even visit them? I mean, how the fuck would you know if NYC is "struggling." I lived there for a long time and it was wonderful. I have friends there, and they don't have anything to complain about. We have posters on this board who live there, and they dispute your characterization.

One city that is definitely struggling is San Francisco. But that's not because of politics; it's because of work from home. Portland suffered from a progressive reform that turned out badly. The reform has since been rescinded, and that is . . . one city, and not a particularly big one at that.
 
Silence Dogood said:
Again, defending the status quo and ignoring the decades of incompetence because of your hatred towards one man
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What would you know about incompetence?

Here's what I would consider a signature example of incompetence:

1. Fire mission critical people who maintain the nuclear weapon supply because you don't know what they do;
2. Try to rehire them in a pinch
3. Struggle to do so because you forgot to (or chose not to) get a contact number of forwarding address.

THAT is incompetence.
 
Silence Dogood said:
Again, defending the status quo and ignoring the decades of incompetence because of your hatred towards one man
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You still haven't provided any evidence that the outlandish claims being made by DOGE are true. Just a website showing $55B in cuts that doesn't indicate any fraud or waste beyond what Musk doesn't like combined with general platitudes around how government is bad and tax cuts stimulate the economy. I ask again, any evidence that the claims being made are true? If not why do you believe anything they say?
 
Silence Dogood said:
Again, defending the status quo and ignoring the decades of incompetence because of your hatred towards one man
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I'm not sure where you gleaned from my post a defense of the status quo or a hatred of one man. I don't even know which man you're referring to - Musk or Trump. I do hate greedy billionaires who lie to the American people with the express purpose of enriching themselves, which covers both Musk and Trump. But I can promise you that there are numerous other people in the Trump admin I hate too - like Stephen Miller, Steve Bannon, Russel Vought, etc. You know, all the Project 2025 people who Trump swore he knew nothing about, then as soon as he got into office he started implementing everything they suggested.

Regardless of whether you think government is incompetent, running around like a bull in a china shop firing people and abolishing agencies with no rhyme or reason (and without following the law) is not the way to fix it. This is not careful or considered reform. This is an attack on constitutional government writ large. The fact that simpletons like you celebrate it as anything other than that is just depressing.
 
rodoheel said:
Interesting, Do you think that means that your company is rife with fraud and waste? Because that's the logic you're applying to the government.

I mean you've been there since 2008 and the company keeps having these problems - do you think that means you need to be fired? That's the logic Trump and Elon are applying to the thousands of government employees they're summarily firing for no reason at all.
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I don't know if rife is accurate, but there's obviously some kind of effort and review process to adjust. Of course, we are also a publicly traded company so we have an inherent inclination toward efficiency. The federal government, as we can see from the national debt, does not.
 
Silence Dogood said:
There's more to an economy than just taxes. You can't oversimplify it like you just did. Whether the "rich" is getting a tax cut is irrelevant considering the top earners are paying over 90% of the tax burden. The US has one of the highest corporations taxes. So cutting "rich" peoples taxes isn't really happening like you think it is. This has been debunked constantly. Democrat ran cities are struggling even you can't defend that garbage.
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Buddy you were the one who said "tax cuts promote economic growth." This is your point we're discussing here, not mine. It's your "oversimplification" you're criticizing, not mine. If you think you can do this sort of goalpost-moving, shell-game-playing dance with me you picked the wrong partner.

Also it's laughable to call a tax cut on the rich "irrelevant" - we're talking about something like a $4 trillion tax cut here, with the vast majority going to the top 10% of tax payers. You want us to act like every cent the government spends inefficiently is a massive travesty then hand-wave away tax cuts that will cost the government trillions in revenue as "irrelevant." All while ignoring that the same lies about tax cuts fueling economic growth have been peddled for decades, with the evidence showing the opposite every time.

Like many modern-day conservatives you seem to just be looking for a boot to lick. What is the purpose of this idiotic loyalty to the Musk/Trump admin that causes you to talk in nonsensical circles trying to defend things that are indefensible? You're like a homeowner who gets mad that the general contractor is taking too long to repair your garage and decides that it would be better to see if shooting it with a bazooka will get better results. The status quo having some obvious problems doesn't mean the only option is to tear it down and start all over again - especially not in the way the Trump/Musk admin is approaching it.
 
NOVAHEEL13 said:
the government will need to rehire more people than most pubs realize. The effects will be a total shitshow. Indeed, most people have zero understanding how our fed gov works and why it needs the people it does
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Psst, the govt is doing more harm than good, it needs to be scaled back. We don't need more bureaucrats, more programs, more funding. Americans overwhelming just voted for Trump, you're dying on a crumbling hill.
 
Silence Dogood said:
There's more to an economy than just taxes. You can't oversimplify it like you just did. Whether the "rich" is getting a tax cut is irrelevant considering the top earners are paying over 90% of the tax burden. The US has one of the highest corporations taxes. So cutting "rich" peoples taxes isn't really happening like you think it is. This has been debunked constantly. Democrat ran cities are struggling even you can't defend that garbage.
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Shoot, I'm not even a "rich person" and *my* taxes are getting cut under the Trump administration's tax proposal. And I'm merely just a dual-high income W-2 earning household who maximizes every possible advantaged retirement and savings account possible. So if my taxes are getting cut, it is absolutely true that the actually "rich people" are going to make out like bandits.

Under the Trump proposal, the middle fifth of Americans would see a tax increase of 2.1 percent of their income while the poorest fifth would see a hike of 4.8 percent. The richest 1 percent would receive an average tax cut equal to 1.2 percent of their income. The next richest 4 percent – with incomes between $360,000 and $914,900 – would receive an average tax cut equal to 1.3 percent of their income. (source linked here)

It's like I said earlier, Republican tax policies overwhelmingly favor the ultra-wealthy and harm everyone from the working class through the upper middle class. Democratic tax policies overwhelmingly favor the working class and folks up through the upper middle class, and "disadvantage" the ultra-wealthy. Obviously it's all a matter of personal policy preference, but unless you're in the top 1-2% of income-earners in the U.S., you're voting against your own financials when you vote Republican.
 
Silence Dogood said:
Psst, the govt is doing more harm than good, it needs to be scaled back. We don't need more bureaucrats, more programs, more funding. Americans overwhelming just voted for Trump, you're dying on a crumbling hill.
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What do you think the word "overwhelming" means? Trump got less than 50% of the vote. And nobody at all voted for Elon Musk - who is unelected and currently completely unaccountable to any regulation or oversight - being given more power over the federal government than any other person has ever dreamed of.
 
ZenMode said:
I don't know if rife is accurate, but there's obviously some kind of effort and review process to adjust. Of course, we are also a publicly traded company so we have an inherent inclination toward efficiency. The federal government, as we can see from the national debt, does not.
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Government spending already has far more in the way of "review" and "oversight" than private companies do, even publicly traded ones.

Also, the whole point is that government shouldn't prize efficiency over everything else. The postal service has to deliver mail to every address in the country, not just the ones it's efficient to deliver to. Social security is set up, intentionally, to value certainty of payments in a certain amount over riskier investment strategies that would bring the opportunity for higher returns but also more risk.

The government isn't run, and shouldn't be run, like a private company. Its goal is not maximizing value for shareholders, it's serving the best interests of the American people. And it is very easy to look at the business world and understand that those two objectives are often very much in conflict. This conservative/libertarian obsession with government being run like a corporation is tiresome.
 
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