A vector of attack has emerged from the fray, a vector that has been directed towards people like me, towards citizens who are ringing bells of concern.
You see this question is not really a question, it's an insult disguised as a question. The framing basically implies that the choice is binary and that the checkbox I'm coloring implicates me in the corruption of the status quo.
To put it simply, it's an ad-hominen attack deployed to avoid the uncomfortable conversation. The conversation where we sit down and go over the facts available to us.
Zack has been very vocal with his political positions. I started following the man for his intellect, he's basically a nerd deity, but I support him for being brave enough to speak out, even if it's hurting his business model.
Trump and Elon keep on telling us their sole mission with the creating of DOGE, and the assigning of Elon as it's head, is to find waste, fraud and abuse.
In paper it's hard to disagree with such a mission for me, since for as long as I've been a tax payer, I've felt robbed by Uncle Sam and his "priorities".
However, all I see from DOGE, from Elon, is chaos. It's as if the motto is:
"break it, if it's needed we will fix it later".
This motto is common in the tech world, I'm told, and since Elon comes from this ecosystem, it's not surprising he thinks it's the right approach, but there's just a giant problem he's failing to see.
The idea that government is supposed to be profitable is laughable at best.
Late professor David Graeber in my opinion lifted the veil on this whole "balancing the budget" myth in one of his most important books.
A must read in my opinion if you feel compelled to fully understand this complicated subject.
Some short quotes from the book to hopefully entice you to look up the late professor, and submerge yourself in his mind for a week.
Before somebody mistakes the late professor for a leftie soy powered intellectual, may I present to you another one of his quotes from another book I strongly recommend:
“We are usually told that democracy originated in ancient Athens—like science, or philosophy, it was a Greek invention. It’s never entirely clear what this is supposed to mean. Are we supposed to believe that before the Athenians, it never really occurred to anyone, anywhere, to gather all the members of their community in order to make joint decisions in a way that gave everyone equal say?”
― David Graeber, Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology
I realize I won't convince anyone who's wearing a "Team Musk" jersey that he's doing everything for personal benefit, but maybe we can begin with a small step in what I hope is: the right direction.
If the focus was and is to save tax paying citizens money, to eliminate waste, fraud and abuse; Should the current administration then:
Consider not spending so much time golfing, costing the country millions of dollars for each trip and security personnel.
Consider not attending big sporting events, again costing millions of dollars to us tax payers, to just parade around and feed hungry egos.
Not use Air Force 1 to fly over Daytona because "it's cool"
Spending millions renaming geographical locations
I'm willing to accept when the government does something right, regardless of who's at the helm. Being disconnected from Political parties, or at least not assigning a color to my heart, allows me to take wins when I can get them.
But if we are to have a conversation on this matter, to move the needle even a thousand of an inch, we need to:
If we can't do these two things, then the conversations we may have will naturally devolve into insults rendering them pointless.
So I leave you with the question I started with, because I would really like the honest answer.
