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by Sloowms 2y ago
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- Dig1t 2y ago[flagged]
- wilg 2y agoSounds like an anti-gay crusade to me!
- handoflixue 2y agoYeah, listing 4 LGBT causes and one DEI one makes it pretty clear what their priorities are.
- mlazos 2y agoLike sure I’m not familiar with the value of these programs, but you get that these programs are literal pennies compared to the government’s budget right? It’s not even worth talking about these. DOGE cuts aren’t going to add up to shit and you bet we’re going to hear “mission accomplished” in six months, meanwhile Russia and China and are going to grab global influence in the absence of USAID and we won’t experience the repercussions for years after these clowns have left office.
- ikiris 2y ago[flagged]
- Dig1t 2y agolol these are my tax dollars! I’m sorry, I have nothing against gay people, but I do not want my tax dollars going to sex change operations in Guatemala. We have people in CA affected by fires, people in Carolina who still need help rebuilding after flooding, people in Hawaii that need to rebuild after their own fires. Did you know that most of FEMAs budget was spent housing migrants who crossed the border illegally instead of helping Americans affected by hurricanes? The current situation is one where bureaucrats and NGOs enrich themselves off the back of taxpayers and the problems that actually need solving in our own country go completely unsolved. We voted to cut all of this garbage, if they can’t spend it wisely then just pay down the national debt, which is at crisis levels BTW, or give it back to the taxpayers.
- MarcelOlsz 2y agoHard to take anyone seriously who rambles about anything other than corporate welfare and income inequality. Anything to distract from class. Now you're sitting there typing up diatribes about sex change operations in Guatemala.
- 1659447091 2y ago> these are my tax dollars! These are not "Your" tax dollars. Some of them are other peoples tax dollars that do want this. So do as my father had and claim that "your" taxes mean you "own" least 1 E4 and a couple of E-2/3's in the military--or whatever your preferred interest is and let the other American tax dollars pay for the things they want. Because You, personally, did not fund the entire US budget. It is not all "your" taxes.
- Dig1t 2y ago> Some of them are other peoples tax dollars that do want this. Well then those people can take their money and donate it directly to the causes they care about. They do not need to use my tax money for it. Yes actually some of this money WAS mine. I paid into this system (actually I was forced to under threat of violence), and I do not want my money being spent on this. I would rather keep my own money or have it used on paying down the national debt. All money spent by the government is ultimately taxation, if it doesn’t come directly from taxpayers it comes from us in the form of inflation. i.e. printing more money than there is value in the economy.
- ModernMech 2y agoI also pay into the the system, and I want to spend my tax dollars on all the things you don't want to. Moreover, I want to defund all the services which benefit you personally. Where does that leave us as a society?
- saagarjha 2y agoIt leaves us in the libertarian utopia which the commenter above you clearly desires to live in.
- unclad5968 2y ago[flagged]
- maxerickson 2y agoTo make the planet, the world, a better place for Americans. Your apparent lack of tolerance for things that do not directly serve your self interest is short sighted and foolhardy. It's sad that your way of thinking has carried the day in the US.
- koolba 2y agoTheres nothing charitable or noble about donating other people’s money. If you feel these causes are worthy, donate your own money privately.
- mmooss 2y agoThe 'other people' agree to it, via the democratic process. It's not stolen money.
- maxerickson 2y agoPromoting US interests isn't "donating". Some of the spending probably does fit that description, but I bet if we had a truth oracle that could actually tell us, it would be a lot less than you think.
- DrillShopper 2y agoI already do
- LastTrain 2y agoAll taxes are theft then?
- aaronharnly 2y agoWe live in a polity. That polity can be generous, well-regarded, respected, feared, and despised. The admixture of those attitudes affects our polity’s ability to pursue its interests. (I also happen to think that our polity should assist the least fortunate on its own merits, but you may not)
- Dig1t 2y ago[flagged]
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- SpicyLemonZest 2y agoWho is Mark Buffington, and why should I trust that his “recent web information” is an accurate and representative sample of spending that DOGE has cut? The official doge.gov site provides no breakdown other than a Twitter stream and an empty savings tab, although they claim on this lovely Valentine's day that "receipts" will be coming "no later than Valentine's day". Big if true!
- lesuorac 2y ago> I would love to hear justifications for things like this and how they help US global influence. Largely the justification is the programs don't do what Musk says they do. You've got to understand the source of your information is from habitual liars. The Tesla's autopilot [1] marketing video still starts of with "The person in the driver's seat is only there for legal reasons. He is not doing anything. The car is driving itself". That person in the driver's seat had to take control of the car numerous times include one time where the car drove off the road and struck a fence. These are not people whose word you can take at face value. Anybody can throw together a list but it doesn't make it real. [1]: https://www.tesla.com/autopilot https://www.tesla.com/autopilot
- Dig1t 2y agoYou can look them up on the actual government website: https://www.usaspending.gov/award/ASST_NON_72052024FA00001_7200/ https://www.usaspending.gov/award/ASST_NON_72052024FA00001_7... > ACTIVITY TO STRENGTHEN TRANS-LED ORGANIZATIONS TO DELIVER GENDER-AFFIRMING HEALTH CARE This is 2M of my tax dollars that was/is being sent to Guatemala for gender affirming care. Which is sex change operations and hormones.
- ModernMech 2y ago
- slashdev 2y ago[flagged]
- Swenrekcah 2y agoYes, it does seems reasonable to destroy seven decades of US global influence buildup because there was a twitter clone made in 2010.
- slashdev 2y agoAmong regimes toppled, prosecutors fired, presidents and vice presidents impeached, domestic and foreign elections interfered with, and literally a hundred other disgraces. Yes, it’s worth it.
- Swenrekcah 2y agoOh, you’re worried about corruption and election interference? One day you’ll realise and don’t be too hard on yourself then. You were not the only one.
- slashdev 2y agoIf you have a point to make, make it. Don’t just take vague jabs at me.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- braebo 2y agoJusta hunch, but my guess is that GP is referring to the fact that the Trump administration and Project 2025 is the most blatant and detrimental manifestation of evil and corruption that the modern western world has seen since WW2, they outline their plans to completely destroy all semblance of justice and public protection from the wealthiest country in the world while ensuring that a free and fair democratic election never takes place again (in our lifetimes at least), and it’s somewhat poetic that people were duped by propaganda into giving them the power they needed to bring an end to the United States of America as it has existed since it was founded because they were tired of being taken advantage of by the system as it was. It wasn’t perfect, but it’s going to look like a Utopia after these guys are done with us.
- knowitnone 2y agoyes but they are my pennies
- onemoresoop 2y agoOk, now not only your pennies but your thousands of dollars in taxes will have a lot less oversight and will be vaccumed up by the mega billionares through contracts with the government. Will those contracts benefit you? Thats a good question. You want to go to mars? Or live in a country where workers are freely discarded when sick, whose rights are about to erode completely? Im afraid nothing good will come out of this unless you’re one of the few benefitting directly. The rest of us are not in for a good time.
- rapatel0 2y agoThis is the false tool that bureaucrats use to justify there excesses. "this is just pennies...no one is going to notice it? If you look at the budget, everything is "just pennies" yet somehow it's 2T deficit with 7T total expenditures. If you were to drill into the big programs (Medicare, Social Security, Defense, etc) there are thousands of programs nested within those. Like it or not someone will need to do the hard work of going line-by-line and accumulating savings to make the budget make sense. There also needs to be a culture shift in gov't. It's not monopoly money---something obvious no?
- refurb 2y agoExactly. The whole budget is made up of pennies. It’s a lazy talking point to say they don’t matter and what’s even worse is the politicians see no issue with wasting pennies of tax payer money! Any waste should be condemned. And like you said you’ll never balance the budget unless you go line by line. As a tax payer I’d love a balanced budget by getting a punch of pennies and keeping core programs the same versus cutting core programs because “it’s too hard” to look at the pennies.
- ModernMech 2y agoYour “government waste” is another’s crucial government program. Since we don’t have a definition for waste, going through finding it is an ideological exercise. What you’re advocating for is an ideological purge for your team, but you wouldn’t be so excited if you didn’t agree with the ideology.
- refurb 2y agoNo. There is plenty of waste in the budget and “nice to have programs”. You only need to look at the list of things being cut. And of course it’s ideological! People vote for a President with certain values and they follow those. It’s how it’s supposed to work.
- ModernMech 2y ago
- ModernMech 2y agoThe evidence is they are proposing another $4.5T tax cut that will eat up whatever purported saving you are excited about. They’re canceling these programs, taking the savings for themselves, cutting Medicaid, and ratcheting up the debt another $3T. These are not the behaviors of someone concerned about decreasing the debt, but accurately reflect the behaviors of someone trying to distract you with hot-button cultural issues while they rob the treasury. Watch what they do, not what they say.
- russdill 2y agoReally working as fast as possible before public perception manages to catch up.
- hoppp 2y agoThey did spend 400 million now on armored tesla cars. All the cuts are going to the right place :)
- Dig1t 2y agoThat was actually granted under the Biden administration and it has since been removed under the new Trump admin.
- darkerside 2y agoThe truth is that nobody has the slightest fucking clue what is going on, and that's why we always should, and do, vote for the person we trust the most. Sadly, we have all diverged wildly in this regard.
- firstlunchables 2y ago[dead]
- cellwebb 2y agoIn Uganda as of 2023 you can get life imprisonment or even the death penalty for being gay. They've even restricted freedom of speech when it comes to discussing gay rights. Even Republicans have condemned it. Does that paint it in a different light? Also, you think that rich people won't use the government to get more money? Seriously?
- sgarland 2y ago> The incentives don’t even make sense, these people have hundreds of billions of dollars already, they do not have an incentive to try to get rich from government because they are already rich. Have you… have you ever met a wealthy person?
- KumaBear 2y agoA few things. Why not copy these systems onto a separate server to prevent tampering. Second, spending is done by Congress. If you don’t like the spending cut it through proper channels we don’t get to decide not to fund something once’s it’s been allocated.
- braebo 2y agoFacism has entered the chat…
- refurb 2y ago[flagged]
- ProcNetDev 2y agoMoney Saved By Canceling Programs Does Not Immediately Flow To The Best Possible Alternative https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/money-saved-by-canceling-programs https://www.astralcodexten.com/p/money-saved-by-canceling-pr...
- ModernMech 2y agoDemocrats and Republicans have different definitions of waste. The programs you are calling waste others call necessary aid. If you give Democrats carte blanche to cancel what they consider waste, maybe Musk’s rockets would be on the chopping block, or some program you consider crucial. That’s the problem with unilateral decision making of this sort, we live in a society of 300 million competing priorities. Can’t you see the problem with having one person decide how all our money is spent? Why can’t trans people fund trans priorities?
- refurb 2y agoIf the Democrats are going to call sex change operations for illegal aliens “necessary” then they are going to continue to lose elections. It certainly hurt Kamala in the last election. But yes, the parties have different definitions of waste, and the Republicans were voted in by voters so they get to determine what is waste right now. Can’t you see how the system is supposed to work? It’s not one person determining waste, it’s voters electing Trump who then determines what is waste.
- ModernMech 2y ago> Republicans were voted in by voters so they get to determine what is waste right now. Not the way they're doing, no. The Executive's job is to execute the laws passed by governments elected since the founding of the country, by Democrats and Republicans and all other parties. Republicans don't get to come in and just enforce the laws they agree with ideologically. If this is truly how the system works going forward, then when the pendulum swings the next guy will cut everything he doesn't like in the name of rooting out ill defined "waste and fraud" of the opposite party. We live in a country split down the middle, Congress is split, and Trump was elected at a slim margin of less than 2%. You can't govern a country of 340 million people by ignoring the the priorities of half of them, even though they pay into the system just the same as everyone else. That's why we elect Representatives and have a Congress to debate these things and find compromise.
- ProcNetDev 2y agoSometime really rich people lie. Maybe their actual goal is different from their stated goal? The 2024 federal deficit was 1.8 trillion I am willing to bet a donation to GiveWell that 2025 will higher. You want to take the other side?
- evenman 2y ago"Men who have sex with men" is a crazy framing of HIV presentation, which by the way, helps everyone, not just LGBT people. Uganda and many other countries regularly prosecutes people for being LGBT, so maybe its not such a bad idea to support those communities by advocating for them. All of DOGE is just "I don't like these programs, so I am going to call them waste". None of those programs are wasteful that you listed, you just don't like them. How about you substantiate how any of these programs are corrupt or wasteful.
- Aeglaecia 2y agooh how i wish more people would avoid becoming lost in the details and see this system for what it very simply is
- kmeisthax 2y agoTime for my favorite intersection of critical theory[1] and systems theory: "The purpose of a system is what it does[0]" [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_purpose_of_a_system_is_what_it_does https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_purpose_of_a_system_is_wha... [1] Ok, I admit, nobody but me has actually made the intersection between the two yet.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- mongol 2y agoThis was too deep for me. Pretend we have a system that works differently than intended. I could say it does not meet its purpose. This quote means something else. Am I wrong?
- jdlshore 2y agoYou say, “The system does not meet its purpose.” They respond, “The purpose of the system is what it does.” In other words, there’s no point in arguing about the purpose. If you want the system to do something else, you have to change the system.
- majormajor 2y agoIgnore what anyone says the intent or purpose is/was. Is anyone motivated to change the system? For a more traditional phrasing: "actions speak louder than words."
- HPsquared 2y agoIt's "revealed preference". The people at the controls don't want to change the dysfunctional system because it serves them personally.
- russdill 2y agoPart of this is a crusade though. There's very much a desire to rip out anything that is considered "woke" or "DEI". But the rest of it is just burning things down for the sake of burning things down.
- MaxfordAndSons 2y agoI think the ripping out of woke stuff is mostly marketing for the political base. Sure, Trump and Musk have some personal stake in it too, but it's not the point. I wouldn't say they're "burning things down for the sake of burning things down", though. The truth is somewhere between what you and gp are contending. There's no moral framework, but there is a framework. They're burning things down so that "the free market" can replace the things they burn down and capture the money that used to go towards doing those things for the public good, and instead do those things for a private profit.
- tuna74 2y agoYeah, it is like the so called "Shock therapy" imposed on failing countries (like Russia in 1991 and some South american countries in the 2000s). The goal is to break down institutions so that more can be privatized.
- jordanb 2y agoYeah and these guys are actually friends with Jeffery Sachs, who was the economist pushing for shock therapy in Russia in the 90s. I strongly feel like these guys see what happened in Russia and see it as a success: the "weak" soviet union was replaced by a "strong" Putin-controlled Russia. The collapse in living standards, lawlessness, etc, was acceptable collateral damage.
- tuna74 2y agoIt might actually be so bad that the last bad effects mentioned are part of the goal this time. It is kind of funny that the people who complain about the "deep state" with some kind of goal actually create something similar with an actual goal.
- Waterluvian 2y agoMusk is such a tumour of a human that I think “it’s just money” is such a sloppy abdication of analyzing the situation.
- HeuristicsCG 2y agoHow does deleting 18F translate into rich people taking money?
- SlightlyLeftPad 2y agoLet’s pretend to think that through a bit as an exercise. While it might not be Musk himself, who could possibly benefit from firing all the people who developed direct file?
- euroderf 2y agoFollow the money.
- majormajor 2y agoWhy make it easy for people to submit their tax return - when the government already has the bulk of that info since their employer, their banks, etc, already reported it - when INSTEAD you can let rich people hawk their paid products to get money from people for it instead? While still requiring more effort. The corruption era is very simple: the government won't be allowed to directly provide a service that someone else could make $$$$ by being a middleman for. It's somewhat ludicrous to have to "file taxes" in the computer era in the first place, but there's a large ideological resistance to both taxes and the government that in some of the more paranoid wings of the country that is well-exploited by the rent-seekers here.
- drewbeck 2y agoA failing/failed state leads to more corporate power and control. I think it’s that simple.
- possibleworlds 2y agoThey only just launched Direct File after years of lobbying to prevent such a system by a consortium of accounting software companies[0]. If it falls apart people will continue to be forced to pay money to these companies just to file their tax. As a comparison, in my country you could submit your own tax return using government supplied desktop software since 1999, and in 2015 that software was replaced with a web product. 1 in 3 people submit their own tax returns using this product. [0] https://thisisunpacked.substack.com/p/irs-direct-tax-filing-end-of-intuit-lobbying https://thisisunpacked.substack.com/p/irs-direct-tax-filing-...
- pipes 2y agoIn what way is it rich people taking money? Time will tell but there's evidence that some government staff grew inexplicably wealthy while in office which would suggest corruption. Corruption in government is terrible for the average citizen, ask anyone from a country that suffers from a lot of it. I really fail to see why auditing government spending is a bad thing?
- hoten 2y agoWhat evidence?
- dav43 2y agoI agree that in principle, it's great that spending is being checked and payments "audited" (I have no clue if thats actually what is happening, I assume it's no KPMNG audit). However, are they really being audited? Is this the manner in which this should be done? I am not a Trump voter. I agree with the outcome they have stated - reduce stupid spending - but I have no idea thats the true motivation, the true goal and I disagree with the manner in which they are doing it. Just because you agree with the dictator doesn't make it right?
- fastasucan 2y ago>Corruption in government is terrible for the average citizen https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/11/us/politics/trump-orders-bribery-corruption.html https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/11/us/politics/trump-orders-...
- sjsdaiuasgdia 2y agoNot to mention the whole Eric Adams quid pro quo. 7 prosecutors resigned when ordered to sign the dismissal! 7! Including people who were put in their jobs during the first Trump admin! It was finally signed by...a new DoJ appointee who was most recently employed as one of Trump's own lawyers. Holy shit! It's barely started and the corruption is everywhere. It's blatant and out in the open, and it's disgusting. I'm going to a protest today. I encourage others to do the same.
- relistan 2y ago
- grandempire 2y agoThey have money. What they’re getting is political power.
- Sloowms 2y agoI agree, as you said in another comment, money is a form of power. The current actions seem to distribute the power amongst wealthy people through money and weakening the government instead of direct power like threatening congress or something like that. But the means don't really matter to me or to them so that is splitting hairs to me. I'm just saying it's not that deep. There is not a meaning or moral that needs to be understood, there is no reasoning that could make them change their ways.
- grandempire 2y agoLet me put it one other way. Is the goal here for them to secure material comfort and luxury for them and their family? I don’t think it is.
- jordanb 2y agoThis is it. What we're seeing is a Bourgeois coup: The silicon valley PayPal guys have become the wealthiest people in the country. Now they are trying to use that wealth to usurp political power.
- Xmd5a 2y agoI believe the old-money establishment countered the Occupy Wall Street movement by pushing wokism as a divide-and-conquer strategy. For about a decade, they had support from most of Silicon Valley, but this alliance weakened as global events forced some to reconsider how a divided America could face the challenges ahead. Following Trump’s second term, the fresh-money establishment saw an opportunity to challenge the old guard. Setting aside their differences, they chose to unite. https://www.businessinsider.com/silicon-valley-defense-contracts-palantir-anduril-openai-spacex-2024-12 https://www.businessinsider.com/silicon-valley-defense-contr... >The group, which could announce strategic partnerships next month, would seek to bring Silicon Valley-style disruption to an industry dominated by so-called "prime" contractors, such as Lockheed Martin and Raytheon. They were soon joined by other tech moguls—Zuckerberg, Bezos, and Gates—who once opposed Trump but now see AI as their chance to wrest power from the old establishment. The difference between sports and politics is that sports are always a duel, while politics, despite appearances, is always a three-player game.
- snozolli 2y agothere is no crusade or moral framework. If you go to the doge website right now, there's a Libs of TikTok tweet shown on the main page. It reads: The US government only recognizes two sexes: Male and Female. This needs to be changed immediately There is absolutely a crusade going on, but I certainly wouldn't call it moral.
- cluckindan 2y agoNo, it is something more sinister than that. Trump is a puppet and his statements are flat out fabrications. Musk and DOGE do outrageous things which just happen to benefit foreign superpowers. Everything the two co-presidents do openly is a red herring meant to mislead and waste time. Who in their right mind opens up RDP and Citrix servers to public internet in DoE and nuclear research laboratory networks? Time is running very short. Foreign powers must be assumed to already hold all possible information about the US government, including nuclear secrets, warfare capabilities, emergency plans, and kompromat of all personnel and political oversight. It won’t be long before the US nuclear arsenal mysteriously disappears.
- TimJRobinson 2y agoCan you link to some sources / information here because I have no idea what you're talking about
- cluckindan 2y agohttps://cyberintel.substack.com/p/doge-exposes-once-secret-government https://cyberintel.substack.com/p/doge-exposes-once-secret-g... You can use Shodan yourself to verify.
- DeepSeaTortoise 2y agoThe servers were added to Shodan starting from Jan 14. Trump took over on Jan 20.
- Gud 2y agoDoubtful. You have to squint your eyes really hard to see this "foreign agent" conncetion. Most likely, there are just greedy idiots at work here.
- AnotherUnknown 2y agoIt's like pulling a heist 101. The best way to steal something is to create a distraction (like taking away people's rights and creating government chaos), and while everyone's paying attention to that, you run in the back a grab what you want. I don't know about giving it away, but taking it for one's own personal gain could be a very attractive proposition, stealing what you can't buy. Just some additional (scary) food for thought.