Excellent piece, Alexis. I find myself in violent agreement (one of my favorite diplomatic phrases) with Jim Nealon as well. The MAGA folks have been telling us the quiet parts out loud for a few years, culminating with Project 2025. Russell Vought has made clear that his goal was that public servants should feel traumatized because they are seen as the villains by the public. Longtime Elon-watcher Kara Swisher believes he is doing this to have sole access to all of the USG’s data to teach his AI large language model. It may not be too late for our democracy, but I do fear it is already too late for the post WW2 rules based order that we created together with our allies. Who will ever trust us again? I was so ashamed to see my former colleague cast the U.S. vote at the UN to, at least symbolically, end the western alliance. No profiles in courage as demonstrated by Danielle Sassoon or Hagan Scotten at the DOJ for our interim UN ambassador. A shameful day for the Foreign Service.
Thanks for this reflection, Francis. When I first realized Musk was inside the Matrix rewriting code that enabled him to seize control of the machine while the rest of us watched helplessly, pressed buttons that no longer connected to anything, and tried to raise our voices in protest before realizing we had been muted, I was reminded of a long ago childhood memory. In the early 70s sometime, my younger brother and I were in Dana Point harbor on a rubber raft, launching a large model wooden boat, bulky and elaborate with several decks (like a mini Titanic) that my brother had painstakingly built and then painted with many bright colors over the previous weeks. He wanted to see how seaworthy it was, and I went with him. And it was fun. The boat floated fine, but was a bit bulky and not so easy to direct or navigate from the raft (it had some kind of motor, but no remote control), so it bumped up against the rocks of the jetty 20 or so yards away. A big husky kid 2-3 years older than we were was standing on the jetty when he saw the boat bump against the rocks below. I remember he scampered down the rocks toward it, saying "wow, what a cool boat!" (or something like that), picked it up, climbed up the rocks, and disappeared over the horizon before we could do anything. We were both so dumbfounded by the brazenness of the act that we didn't know what to say, and said nothing. We didn't even yell for someone to stop him. I know there were people around. We just watched the kid walk away with my brother's boat under his arm... My brother and I still talk about why we remained paralyzed, mute, unable to act. We both remember the feeling. Incredible... That's kind of what I felt like when I first saw Musk et al stealing what used to be our government. The act is so out in the open, so brazen, so public, that many of us (I include myself in this group) don't even know what to say. I suppose we're asking ourselves if it is really happening. Can it be? Is it possible? How can he do this? Won't someone stop him? But I'm wondering if we'll ever see our boat again. Anything else I try to say about it falls short. I appreciate you weighing in.
Perfectly captures the price we're paying for the actions of a small segment of society that got seduced by Trumpism and enabled his wrecking ball administration. In addition to the ruining of careers and lives, Musk and Trump are doing enormous damage to any sense of professionalism and propriety in how government can work. You articulately detailed how that painful horror is playing out in the arena that you know.
Thanks Joel. These are times that try our souls. Probably the framework of our great republic too. I can imagine a genuine pursuit of authentic government efficiency, tough to do in the best of circumstances, but this wouldn’t be it. Or at least not this kind of efficiency.
This piece reflects my own sentiments precisely. We all understand that disruption can serve it's purpose. It just can't be the end result. Chaos is, by definition, not an organizing principle. It's hard to see how air traffic control, health care for veterans, infectious disease monitoring, weather forecasting, and safeguarding nuclear weapons benefit from chaos. But we are in the process of finding out!
I call on political historians to find some precedent in which a country, or government, determines to dismantle and destroy itself in this way. It's like a post-Darwinian version of national evolution, with the mechanism of natural selection punctuated by paroxysms of pure insanity. This would appear to be one. Our great grandchildren, should they have the (good or bad) fortune to exist in the future, will wonder what it was we were doing at that time. Dunno.
Yes, excellent again, as expected. However, it is also dismal news you bring us Alec.
In your wonderfully alliterative sentence, the one word change I would make would be to lose the "dear," and move "demented" up to take its place. Do I also assume you refrain from profanity for some good reason? For instance, wouldn't that word "daffy," be improved, and rendered more accurate, by placing before it a 7 letter word beginning with 'F.'
Ian - I think I would accept your edit. At this point, it’s hard to calibrate one’s rhetoric to match the madness of current events. Not even parody can keep up (at least not the kind I can write). Meanwhile, many (if not most) Americans continue to get on their feet and clap raucously even if they don’t quite know why. By destroying everything that’s best about our country (democracy, checks and balances, freedom of speech, openness to outsiders, a grounding in decency and common sense etc.), our mad King (if not fucking demented president) is making America great again. Hooray!
Alec - I'm aware of your world perspective as I'm aware of your upbringing & career to ask you - what is a better way to address deficits as to "secure" future of economy for grandchildren, great-grandchildren. This chain saw approach is rad & uncertainty pervasive... The young are so different than we were & need credit for their perspective on how to function in the global world we find ourselves in. I don't understand what would be a better way to attack deficit? A strategy that would be effective??? We've gone from extreme to extreme it seems.. I can't grasp this process with my very limited knowledge of the world. HELP!! I'm trying... Hope you are well in retirement my friend.
Thanks for reading my modest musings, Lyn, and for writing, and for asking a very good question. Not sure I have a good answer. If I do, it has two parts.
1) Even if many Americans and almost all Republicans still believe Trump is doing a great job, the question is whether what they believe to be happening is REALLY happening. That's a huge issue having to do with perception vs reality. What is a fact? What is true? What is make believe? What is BS? Etc. I feel like we've entered an Orwellian world at this point, where true is false and false is true, and 2+2 is definitely not 4 anymore. (Many smart people have written about this; I'm trying put my thoughts together separately because this underlies most of our other problems, but so far I'm falling short.) From what I see from up close having served in the government and knowing many people who still do, the Trump/Musk approach is NOT about addressing those legitimate questions, it's about destroying government. It really is. In developing countries, government services are so bad that many people, particularly rich people, don't believe they should pay taxes, and they generally don't because they (the rich people) are more powerful than the government. Whatever real problems we have with government bloat and inefficiency (I've seen it myself), I'm pretty sure most people (including most Republicans) don't want the government destroyed in this way. And I'm guessing they won't want to pay for privatized services in the future that government currently provides for "free" (with our taxes). I won't list all the wonderful things government does here, but that is first and foremost.
2) As for attacking the deficit, I'm all for it. As you know, there are two ways to do this. One is by cutting spending. If you were serious about this, you would have to go after entitlements. I won't put the budget pie chart here, but that means medicare, medicaid, social security etc. which make up well over half of the federal budget. Next is military spending, which is close to 20%. (Military procurement is a huge boondoggle--planes, ships, high tech weapons etc.--as many DOD people will tell you.) After that, if you were going to where most of the rest of the bloat is, you'd have to go at farm subsidies at the Department of Agriculture.... The problem there is political. Way too important. Maybe untouchable. But if you were serious about cutting spending, you absolutely would NOT start with USAID (less than 1% of the budget), or most of the other places Musk is targeting with his indiscriminate "chainsaw" approach. (I won't bore you with my thoughts about Argentine president Javier Milei, who gave Musk the idea and a chainsaw, but -- having served in Argentina for three year as political counselor -- I have some.) Beyond that, not that it would be easy, you could cut across the board, but after doing due diligence about who's not doing their job or performing useful functions. But you absolutely would NOT target new hires or newly promoted professionals, who make up over 90% of so-called probationary employees (the remainder are those you might be thinking of when hearing the word, poor employees who are on a PIP--professional improvement plan--or the like).
The other way or attacking the deficit is increasing taxes, particularly on those who don't pay their fair share. How much tax has Donald Trump paid? How about Elon Musk? If rich people (ok, very rich people) paid their fair share, we'd be a lot closer to the target. Take Social Security. You know that earnings beyond approximately $175K are not taxed for social security. As I understand it, you could guarantee solvency of the SS system into the indefinite future by removing that cap. Simple enough mathematically, but politically? The deficit problem began in earnest with Ronald Reagan. Bill Clinton was able to reverse it, but then George W caused it to balloon again.
Anyway, I've gone on too long. Our problem is political, rooted in the excessive role of money in politics. We've become a kind of plutocracy (like many places but on a larger scale), and we look like we're heading deeper down that road, which will be very good for a handful of people but pretty fucked up for most of us, in my humble opinion.
Excellent piece, Alexis. I find myself in violent agreement (one of my favorite diplomatic phrases) with Jim Nealon as well. The MAGA folks have been telling us the quiet parts out loud for a few years, culminating with Project 2025. Russell Vought has made clear that his goal was that public servants should feel traumatized because they are seen as the villains by the public. Longtime Elon-watcher Kara Swisher believes he is doing this to have sole access to all of the USG’s data to teach his AI large language model. It may not be too late for our democracy, but I do fear it is already too late for the post WW2 rules based order that we created together with our allies. Who will ever trust us again? I was so ashamed to see my former colleague cast the U.S. vote at the UN to, at least symbolically, end the western alliance. No profiles in courage as demonstrated by Danielle Sassoon or Hagan Scotten at the DOJ for our interim UN ambassador. A shameful day for the Foreign Service.
Thanks for this reflection, Francis. When I first realized Musk was inside the Matrix rewriting code that enabled him to seize control of the machine while the rest of us watched helplessly, pressed buttons that no longer connected to anything, and tried to raise our voices in protest before realizing we had been muted, I was reminded of a long ago childhood memory. In the early 70s sometime, my younger brother and I were in Dana Point harbor on a rubber raft, launching a large model wooden boat, bulky and elaborate with several decks (like a mini Titanic) that my brother had painstakingly built and then painted with many bright colors over the previous weeks. He wanted to see how seaworthy it was, and I went with him. And it was fun. The boat floated fine, but was a bit bulky and not so easy to direct or navigate from the raft (it had some kind of motor, but no remote control), so it bumped up against the rocks of the jetty 20 or so yards away. A big husky kid 2-3 years older than we were was standing on the jetty when he saw the boat bump against the rocks below. I remember he scampered down the rocks toward it, saying "wow, what a cool boat!" (or something like that), picked it up, climbed up the rocks, and disappeared over the horizon before we could do anything. We were both so dumbfounded by the brazenness of the act that we didn't know what to say, and said nothing. We didn't even yell for someone to stop him. I know there were people around. We just watched the kid walk away with my brother's boat under his arm... My brother and I still talk about why we remained paralyzed, mute, unable to act. We both remember the feeling. Incredible... That's kind of what I felt like when I first saw Musk et al stealing what used to be our government. The act is so out in the open, so brazen, so public, that many of us (I include myself in this group) don't even know what to say. I suppose we're asking ourselves if it is really happening. Can it be? Is it possible? How can he do this? Won't someone stop him? But I'm wondering if we'll ever see our boat again. Anything else I try to say about it falls short. I appreciate you weighing in.
Great analogy!
Perfectly captures the price we're paying for the actions of a small segment of society that got seduced by Trumpism and enabled his wrecking ball administration. In addition to the ruining of careers and lives, Musk and Trump are doing enormous damage to any sense of professionalism and propriety in how government can work. You articulately detailed how that painful horror is playing out in the arena that you know.
Thanks Joel. These are times that try our souls. Probably the framework of our great republic too. I can imagine a genuine pursuit of authentic government efficiency, tough to do in the best of circumstances, but this wouldn’t be it. Or at least not this kind of efficiency.
This piece reflects my own sentiments precisely. We all understand that disruption can serve it's purpose. It just can't be the end result. Chaos is, by definition, not an organizing principle. It's hard to see how air traffic control, health care for veterans, infectious disease monitoring, weather forecasting, and safeguarding nuclear weapons benefit from chaos. But we are in the process of finding out!
I call on political historians to find some precedent in which a country, or government, determines to dismantle and destroy itself in this way. It's like a post-Darwinian version of national evolution, with the mechanism of natural selection punctuated by paroxysms of pure insanity. This would appear to be one. Our great grandchildren, should they have the (good or bad) fortune to exist in the future, will wonder what it was we were doing at that time. Dunno.
Yes, excellent again, as expected. However, it is also dismal news you bring us Alec.
In your wonderfully alliterative sentence, the one word change I would make would be to lose the "dear," and move "demented" up to take its place. Do I also assume you refrain from profanity for some good reason? For instance, wouldn't that word "daffy," be improved, and rendered more accurate, by placing before it a 7 letter word beginning with 'F.'
Ian - I think I would accept your edit. At this point, it’s hard to calibrate one’s rhetoric to match the madness of current events. Not even parody can keep up (at least not the kind I can write). Meanwhile, many (if not most) Americans continue to get on their feet and clap raucously even if they don’t quite know why. By destroying everything that’s best about our country (democracy, checks and balances, freedom of speech, openness to outsiders, a grounding in decency and common sense etc.), our mad King (if not fucking demented president) is making America great again. Hooray!
Alec - I'm aware of your world perspective as I'm aware of your upbringing & career to ask you - what is a better way to address deficits as to "secure" future of economy for grandchildren, great-grandchildren. This chain saw approach is rad & uncertainty pervasive... The young are so different than we were & need credit for their perspective on how to function in the global world we find ourselves in. I don't understand what would be a better way to attack deficit? A strategy that would be effective??? We've gone from extreme to extreme it seems.. I can't grasp this process with my very limited knowledge of the world. HELP!! I'm trying... Hope you are well in retirement my friend.
Thanks for reading my modest musings, Lyn, and for writing, and for asking a very good question. Not sure I have a good answer. If I do, it has two parts.
1) Even if many Americans and almost all Republicans still believe Trump is doing a great job, the question is whether what they believe to be happening is REALLY happening. That's a huge issue having to do with perception vs reality. What is a fact? What is true? What is make believe? What is BS? Etc. I feel like we've entered an Orwellian world at this point, where true is false and false is true, and 2+2 is definitely not 4 anymore. (Many smart people have written about this; I'm trying put my thoughts together separately because this underlies most of our other problems, but so far I'm falling short.) From what I see from up close having served in the government and knowing many people who still do, the Trump/Musk approach is NOT about addressing those legitimate questions, it's about destroying government. It really is. In developing countries, government services are so bad that many people, particularly rich people, don't believe they should pay taxes, and they generally don't because they (the rich people) are more powerful than the government. Whatever real problems we have with government bloat and inefficiency (I've seen it myself), I'm pretty sure most people (including most Republicans) don't want the government destroyed in this way. And I'm guessing they won't want to pay for privatized services in the future that government currently provides for "free" (with our taxes). I won't list all the wonderful things government does here, but that is first and foremost.
2) As for attacking the deficit, I'm all for it. As you know, there are two ways to do this. One is by cutting spending. If you were serious about this, you would have to go after entitlements. I won't put the budget pie chart here, but that means medicare, medicaid, social security etc. which make up well over half of the federal budget. Next is military spending, which is close to 20%. (Military procurement is a huge boondoggle--planes, ships, high tech weapons etc.--as many DOD people will tell you.) After that, if you were going to where most of the rest of the bloat is, you'd have to go at farm subsidies at the Department of Agriculture.... The problem there is political. Way too important. Maybe untouchable. But if you were serious about cutting spending, you absolutely would NOT start with USAID (less than 1% of the budget), or most of the other places Musk is targeting with his indiscriminate "chainsaw" approach. (I won't bore you with my thoughts about Argentine president Javier Milei, who gave Musk the idea and a chainsaw, but -- having served in Argentina for three year as political counselor -- I have some.) Beyond that, not that it would be easy, you could cut across the board, but after doing due diligence about who's not doing their job or performing useful functions. But you absolutely would NOT target new hires or newly promoted professionals, who make up over 90% of so-called probationary employees (the remainder are those you might be thinking of when hearing the word, poor employees who are on a PIP--professional improvement plan--or the like).
The other way or attacking the deficit is increasing taxes, particularly on those who don't pay their fair share. How much tax has Donald Trump paid? How about Elon Musk? If rich people (ok, very rich people) paid their fair share, we'd be a lot closer to the target. Take Social Security. You know that earnings beyond approximately $175K are not taxed for social security. As I understand it, you could guarantee solvency of the SS system into the indefinite future by removing that cap. Simple enough mathematically, but politically? The deficit problem began in earnest with Ronald Reagan. Bill Clinton was able to reverse it, but then George W caused it to balloon again.
Anyway, I've gone on too long. Our problem is political, rooted in the excessive role of money in politics. We've become a kind of plutocracy (like many places but on a larger scale), and we look like we're heading deeper down that road, which will be very good for a handful of people but pretty fucked up for most of us, in my humble opinion.