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DOGE's only public ledger is riddled with mistakes
- wdb 2y agoRoughly 40 years of hard work of some entities, finally getting somewhere. Worrying and hope it doesn’t further spread to Europe.
- mlnj 2y agoAnother thread getting flagged: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43138522 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43138522
- ck2 2y agoand isn't annual budget $2,400 billion? so basically without caution or care or actually evaluating gains vs investments just slash and burn scorched earth, destroying lives to save 55 out of 2400 billion? which might only really be 7 billion "saved" ? How about the $10 million per month to go play golf? Or $20 million to watch half the superbowl and leave?
- laweijfmvo 2y agoyou should say, the $0.01 billion to play golf. switching to millions makes it look like more and is directly against your own point.
- Axsuul 2y agoThat $20 million number does not pass the sniff test.
- TaurenHunter 2y ago[flagged]
- TaurenHunter 2y ago[flagged]
- projectileboy 2y agoFrankly, this doesn’t matter. What matters is that an unofficial agency of the executive branch is deciding unilaterally - with no oversight - to stop payments that were voted on by Congress. Even if Musk and team were geniuses and doing brilliant work, it would be outside the rule of law.
- munchler 2y agoIt still matters. In addition to just being criminals, now we know that they are also incompetent.
- krapp 2y agoPeople already knew Trump was incompetent, other people just called it "Trump Derangement Syndrome." People already knew Musk was incompetent, other people just called it "Musk Derangement Syndrome" People were saying DOGE was full of incompetents prior to this, simply judging by their methods (or lack thereof.) They were dismissed as partisans, or using whatever thought-terminating cliche they have on hand. Knowing this doesn't mean a thing, no one is doing anything about it.
- rayiner 2y ago[flagged]
- anigbrowl 2y agoCongress is well within its rights to delegate such authority. That would of course never make it through Congress. Counselor, you know better than to beg the question like that. It's disappointing to see such an intelligent person resort to such fallacious arguments.
- rayiner 2y ago> Congress is well within its rights to delegate such authority. Right, Congress told the executive “here’s three billion dollars, spend it on foreign development.” That means the executive decides how that money will be spent. It is entirely within its rights to cancel particular grants. Though eventually it will have to seek rescission as to the $3 billion if it doesn’t use all the money. That’s a long ways away. And I’m quite confident I’m not going out on a limb when I say line items for “DEI in Serbia” would never make it through congress.
- idkfasayer 2y ago[flagged]
- wnevets 2y agoThese criminals don't care, their goal is to spread FUD then rob the tax payers.
- jmward01 2y agoPeople aren't voting for what benefits them which means we are now in post policy politics. That means that what matters is the messaging and not the actual things done or the impact of those things on people. This leads to doing things that you have the ability to message the way you want and not doing things that help people. The MAGA crowd figured this out and figured out that angry yelling is the easiest message out there. This is why democrats lost. They kept trying to have policy discussions about how to run the country along with ways to implement policy tied to impact on people, but that is hard to message. The MAGA crowd just finds things they can yell about. By the time impact happens they just yell about something else, louder and the people being hurt are just ignored. The discussion about how much money is being saved/spent/etc is basically meaningless in post policy politics. The average person can have a massive drop in life expectancy and quality of life and it won't impact their voting so why does it matter how and where government spending happens? The sound bite is all that people are looking at and because of that DOGE is a huge success for those using it to get what they want.
- bamboozled 2y agoI don’t really see a remedy for this behaviour too. It’s quite horrifying. Like being strapped into a plane heading for the ground.
- IAmGraydon 2y agoThis post is a series of illogical leaps strung together one after another, starting with the first sentence. The core fallacy that is obvious in your post is that you seem to think everyone who voted for Trump is part of this “MAGA” group of yelling yokel troglodytes. Your viewpoint is utterly saturated with obvious polarization. I honestly don’t know a single MAGA or anyone who would be caught dead at a Trump rally, but I know lots of Trump voters. Most of them do care about policy and they say the same thing - they don’t really like Trump, but they’re tired of bad policies and extreme liberalization of everything.
- rat87 2y agoVoting for Trump is stupid. Im sure there are plenty of people with lots of schooling that voted for Trump. They made a stupid choice. Even if you agree with some policies Trump is the height of incompetence fraud corruption and abuse of power. Gutting effcient and useful goverment agencies to fund the Wall is stupid and wasteful. It also wont reduce illegal immigration.
- ruraljuror 2y agoKeeping Musk’s interests in mind helps clarify what’s going on. Scorching earth and constantly lying is the playbook for dismantling agencies with oversight into the companies he runs and agencies that promote potential growth of competitors (e.g. pulling the ladder up behind him after the DoE’s Tesla loan). The Canada/China tariffs will cripple other automakers who depend on trade while Tesla’s integrated manufacturing chain will leave them immune and provide a massive advantage. I don’t see any reason to put any stock into any motivation DOGE may have toward increasing governmental efficiency, it is a purposeful distraction.
- timewizard 2y ago[flagged]
- ruraljuror 2y ago>> and agencies that promote potential growth of competitors > Why are government agencies picking winners and losers at all? Not sure how you got from my statement about promoting competition to the govt picking winners and losers. > And no other automaker has ever received a loan from the US government? My point was that Musk through Doge is trying to make it more difficult for automakers to get loans in the future, after Tesla has already benefitted from them. For some reason you misconstrue my point. > Where do the batteries come from? Did a quick search and they are manufactured in plants in China, Nevada and Germany.
- thrance 2y agoYup, that's basic class consciousness on Musk's part. The American people simply forgot that billionaires' interests are diametrically opposed to theirs, a fact they knew well in FDR's time. Hopefully this situation will act as a booster shot, and not slip into full-blow oligarchy.
- pclmulqdq 2y agoHe doesn't have "class consciousness." He has consciousness of his own interests. That is what pretty much everyone has.
- dimal 2y agoFocusing on what’s being cut and whether the cuts are “right” misses the point. The richest man in the world bought himself a department in the US government and now has free will to run amok. Our country has been an oligarchy for a while now, but it was behind the scenes and there was some hope of dialing it back, however slim. Now it’s nakedly out in the open. What if this kind of shit becomes the new normal? We’ve been worried that Trump will become a dictator, but this almost seems worse.
- TheAlchemist 2y agoExcept, these are not mistakes. This is every single Musk's company modus operandi. Completely made up or inflated numbers, unrealistic timelines etc. Customers or investors buying into it, but if you look under the hood, outside of government subsides and contract, there is pretty much 0 money made from ALL of his businesses. He's just using the same playbook now, except when people will realize that the 5000$ DOGE checks are bullshit (btw, 5000 x ~150M taxpayers = 750 Billion $...) they may finally wake up.
- adrr 2y agoThey won't be able to cut checks unless congress approves. They'll say they will cut checks, get sued and lose. They'll blame the judicial system and it will probably be a pretense to undermine that branch of government.
- thrance 2y agoSo far they have found pretty much no resistance. The few judges raising their voices are threatened with jail to make examples. Do not put too much faith in the strength of your institutions.
- cwalv 2y ago> but if you look under the hood .. there is pretty much 0 money made from ALL of his businesses. There are many valid criticisms of Musk. Saying that he has not added any real value in his ventures, or that he doesn't really know how to make money, just destroys your credibility.
- TheAlchemist 2y agoHow so ? Which company is making money ? Especially if you exclude government subsides and contracts ? Tesla lost tons of money, and only recently (and probably for a very brief period of time) was profitable - mostly from various government subsides and help (through carbon credits, IRA for Tesla buyers etc). SpaceX so far did not make any profit (or more specifically they said they achieved profitability last year, but you would need to trust Musk with his word on that...) and is 90% dependent on government contracts. Twitter is a money furnace, so is Neuralink, Boring Company and xAI. I didn't say he did not add 'real value'. Obviously these companies would not exist without him. I'm just saying that profitability wise, so far (and it's been a long time for most of them) they are not or barely profitable.
- sxyuan 2y agoFor those who want to have a substantive discussion on the federal budget and believe these cuts are justified, I have a few questions (putting aside questions of constitutionality for this thread): 1. There are claims that federal spending is out of control. How do you square that with the fact that spending as a percentage of GDP is only slightly elevated compared to the historical average going back to at least the 1970s, with the main deviation in the past few years coming from the after-effects of the pandemic? [1] 2. Federal spending largely falls into a few categories: taking care of the elderly (36%), defense and veterans (20%), taking care of the poor or disabled (22%), and interest on existing debt (13%). [2] This adds up to 91% of the budget. The US population is aging, which means that 36% slice is going to naturally grow. What do you think should be cut, and how? 3. The US pays far more for health care (28% of the budget if you include Medicare) and with worse outcomes on average. Why shouldn't the health insurance industry be the first item on the chopping block? 4. Corporate tax receipts have been steadily falling as a percentage of GDP. [3] Why shouldn't corporations (that benefit from a healthy and educated workforce, a safe and secure environment, a working transportation system, etc.) be paying their fair share to keep the national debt in check? [1] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/FYONGDA188S https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/FYONGDA188S [2] https://fiscaldata.treasury.gov/americas-finance-guide/federal-spending/ https://fiscaldata.treasury.gov/americas-finance-guide/feder... [3] https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=1DUdb https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=1DUdb
- e40 2y agoThe reason these questions are not front and center is that the people with money don’t want to talk about them. And, the ensure we are kept busy with cheap gadgets, entertaining tv and movies and enough controversies that don’t matter to last a lifetime. Alsr, the population is less educated and able to actually think critically about these issues than they used to be.
- noirbot 2y agoCitation on that last point? The amount of people I know who were the first in their family to attend college, and sometimes even graduate high school, makes me question that people are measurably less educated.
- JackYoustra 2y agoRule of law is what allows us to grow. Acemoglu won a nobel prize showing that institutions cause growth. Destroy institutions and you'll undershoot potential.
- thrance 2y agoPet peeve: there is no Nobel prize of economics, Alfred Nobel didn't include "economy" in his will. Instead there is a "Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences" whose purpose is to give credibility to the unscientific field of economics. The prize itself is mostly awarded to neoliberalists economists and does not often represent the majority views in the field.
- ctrlp 2y agoYATP: Yet Another Tool of Patronage.
- tovej 2y agoThe price is awarded exclusively to neoclassical economists, because it's effectively a marketing tool for neoclassical economics, which is the economic theory base of neoliberal shareholder capitalism.
- JackYoustra 2y agoYou can look at the economic experts panel to find the majority view of the field: https://www.kentclarkcenter.org/us-economic-experts-panel/ https://www.kentclarkcenter.org/us-economic-experts-panel/ and most nobel prize winners have majority support. If you have objections to acemoglu, please show me the majority of economists that object to him?
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago> there is no Nobel prize of economics It's commonly called the Nobel prize of economics. That it's not a classic Nobel prize is mostly finance jargon. > prize itself is mostly awarded to neoliberalists economists Source? The period in which neoliberal economics won the prize was when neoliberal economics was in vogue (and most successful and producing useful theories).
- wolfcola 2y ago“mistakes”
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- TehCorwiz 2y agoThis was basically the same shtick he did with Twitter. He "open sourced" the "algorithm" but it was basically a git repo of BS that rarely gets updated and doesn't seem to match what actually happens.
- catchcatchcatch 2y ago[dead]
- etchalon 2y agoI for am shocked that something associated with Elon Musk would be riddled with mistakes.
- iluvcommunism 2y ago[dead]
- cwalv 2y ago> While the DOGE team has surely cut some number of billions of dollars, its slapdash accounting adds to a pattern of recklessness by the group, which has recently gained access to sensitive government payment systems. Billions. I understand that it may be far from sufficient to prevent the US from entering a debt spiral if/when interest rates increase (or stagflation if/when yield curve control is enacted to prevent a debt spiral), but it's still a lot of money. No doubt mistakes have been made, but it's very unlikely that DOGE critics will be able to convince most tax papers that the pain wasn't worth it.
- crooked-v 2y agoI absolutely expect that the slapdash firing and cutting is going to cost the country much more than it saves over the next ten years.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- jazz9k 2y ago[flagged]
- owl_vision 2y agoHave these changes been analyzed prior to implementation? Laying off electrical line workers during snow season in Paific Northwest is really not a good idea. As an example.
- aqueueaqueue 2y agoOh that doge. Thought this would be about the cryptocurrency.
- userbinator 2y agoI would not be surprised at all if the two somehow became even more related in the near future.
- frugalmail 2y agoI think what doge is doing should always be happening. According to the article the website doesn't have the rigor they're expecting. But then again, I never interpreted it as a double entry ledger for the public to review. They're moving fast and put in a position able to make the changes that many know should be made, but lacked the power to make the changes. As long as it's all legal, we should all be glad that there is opportunity for things to come to light. The article even confirms billions have been saved already. Sounds good to me, considering what some of the expenses were. The fact that workers, in many cases new or probationary, sued for irreparable hardship, when many organizations go through layoffs every few years is exemplary of a sense of entitlement that has been calloused.
- InfiniteTitan 2y ago> As long as it's all legal It’s quite clear by the preponderance of the evidence piling up that these actions are not legal. The cost of defending all of the employment actions that result from this will easily eclipse the “savings” presented.
- ave_b_2011 2y agoFirst of all none of this is legal- it’s all money that is appropriated. Secondly, this is a see-through attempt to further extend an already short staffed federal government in order to justify selling it off in pieces to the millionaire and billionaire class. One final question, is Elon Musk doing this all purely out of the goodness of his heart? He has nothing to gain from what he is doing? Basic game theory suggests that maybe he is acting more selfishly than we are being told.
- 29athrowaway 2y agoDOGE = austerity measures Without saying austerity
- presentation 2y agoNah austerity is the excuse, it’s just an ideological purge.
- slaw 2y agoBoth austerity and purge are good.
- presentation 2y agoExcept austerity won’t happen because trumps policies will increase the deficit by a lot while DOGE will save peanuts
- _DeadFred_ 2y agoRight in line with Umberto Eco's item 3 in his list of common features of fascism: "3. The cult of action for action’s sake. “Action being beautiful in itself, it must be taken before, or without, any previous reflection. Thinking is a form of emasculation.” https://www.openculture.com/2024/11/umberto-ecos-list-of-the-14-common-features-of-fascism.html https://www.openculture.com/2024/11/umberto-ecos-list-of-the...
- IAmGraydon 2y agoOk, but while I disagree with Musks actions, more than half of the 14 items don’t fit what’s currently happening.
- _DeadFred_ 2y agoOnly meets HALF of the fascism warning signs you say? Nevermind then. Nothing to see here.
- mp05 2y agoSurely there is some critical threshold that indicates that we can reject the hypothesis that fascism isn't happening?
- guax 2y agoNo. Because If you say it's happening you violate #4.
- trustinmenowpls 2y agoThe point I think is that at least half could apply to nearly an government or group, I don't know who this guy is or why his rules are important and merit any discussion, but generally generic rules written generically that can be interpreted any which way aren't super helpful in any discussion.
- rollinDyno 2y agoIn his essay, Eco says no instance of fascism will present itself with all items. He starts out by saying that fascism is very hard to define, so the 14 item list is meant to be a soft guide more than an absolute rule book. I am starting to accept that this is a conversation we are going to be having over and over again, even after Elon and Trump. We are rightly traumatised by the excesses of the past, so it's very easy to imagine that any slight will inevitably lead to full on fascism. This last qualification of fascism could be key, it differentiates 20th century fascism to what we are seeing today. We don't yet know whether this new form of fascism is just as harmful. For instance, when debating about whether Elon—who meets many of the elements in Eco's list—is a nazi or not, people are having very different conversations. There is no nazi party Elon can be a member of so that's not what I've been interested in. For me it has been more about the possibility of Elon advocating the same extreme policies fascist parties did. We could say he shares some of the worldview as the white supremacists, but would he go as far as implementing a 'final solution' to remedy the diagnosis?
- patagonianboy 2y agoDebt will skyrocket. They will slash billions of dollars from federal spending under the guise of "efficiency," while simultaneously cutting taxes for corporations and millionaires. The result: the first trillionaires will emerge, and they won't be the oil sheikhs you expect.
- mint2 2y agoit’s easy to be a trillionaire with four years of bad inflation when you start with 50B.
- chmorgan_ 2y agoI'd be interested in whether they are fixing mistakes that are reported to them. If they won't then there is an issue. If they do then maybe this is just another nitpicking attack on DOGE.
- voiper1 2y agoFrom the article: "... but did not respond to numerous questions about other aspects of the group’s accounting." It's not "nitpicking" when the reports of where/how much they are saving money -- their purported goal -- is _fundamentally_ inaccurate in many circumstances that can be verified. And even worse for what that implies about everything else that can't be verified.
- BLKNSLVR 2y agoI believe Musk and Trump have doubled and even tripled down on the ridiculously implausible $50 million in condoms for Hamas claim. Correcting mistakes isn't their goal. Maintaining the narrative is their goal, seemingly at any cost.
- llm_nerd 2y agoNitpicking? They are in a role of "auditor". The most important requirement of an auditor -- a mandatory requirement -- is accuracy and correctness. It isn't nitpicking to point out that they are either intentionally lying, or are profoundly incompetent at the role they anointed themselves with.
- reubenswartz 2y ago> just another nitpicking attack on DOGE I'm not sure that pointing out that DOGE is unconstitutional, a massive security threat, and not designed to save money but to consolidate power and punish enemies is nitpicking...
- mannyv 2y agoNow they're fact checking the government. About time.
- cytocync 2y ago[dead]
- zombiwoof 2y agoAnd these are the people lying about self driving cars
- maga_2020 2y agoI would like to have a substitative discussion of how to validate the claims that DOGE is not saving as much as they claim. Should I trust the Intercept's article [1] that New York times is referring to? I guess a larger point is that NY Times wants to their readers to focus on particular instances where Doge, they believe, they miscalculated their impact on waste. But, in my mind, does not change the overall intend of Doge's remit, the short term and long term benefits of improving organization efficiencies, reducing corruption, and reducing federal budget. 50 years from now, the next generation will be looking at these times, and these efforts -- as a rare example of positive, transformational polices, a bloodless revolution of the common sense defeating the monster of corruption, selective persecutions, identity politics and senseless wars. [1]https://archive.is/MCUX8 https://archive.is/MCUX8
- worthless-trash 2y agoTo be fair, they are drawing from bad data so it shouldn't be a surprise.
- shadowvoxing 2y ago[dead]
- hofo 2y agoSounds like waste, fraud, and abuse to me
- refurb 2y agoIf we look at one example of the errors the article calls out: "The contracting company, D&G Solutions, confirmed to CBS News that this was originally the result of an accounting error and that $3.8 million of the contract had already been expended." So DOGE reported $8B because the receipt indicated $8B? So DOGE reported the saving because the system said it was spending $8B? That is an error, but one that originated with the data?
- rawgabbit 2y agoThe FAQ of the FPDS database explains this is not the system of record. It is not the real accounting database for federal contracts. Instead, after a contract is signed, contracting officers are supposed to report it to FPDS. It is like (incorrectly) manually filling out a timesheet. There was no $8B contract. https://www.fpds.gov/wiki/index.php/FPDS_FAQ https://www.fpds.gov/wiki/index.php/FPDS_FAQ “What is FPDS not designed to collect? The following data elements will not be found in FPDS. Contracting officers can’t put this information in FPDS even if they want to. Most of this data resides at the individual contracting office.”
- alfiedotwtf 2y agoWhy aren’t people seeing through the facade?! The point of DOGE isn’t to save money, it’s to shut government programs that don’t align to Project 2025’s agenda.
- mibes 2y agoYep. Reward friends and punish enemies. At long last the right has learned to play the game that the left has played for decades
- drawkward 2y ago>the game that the left has played for decades Can you give some examples, please?
- mibes 2y agoTrivially demonstrated by immediate downvotes for posting anything left critical on HN
- drawkward 2y agoTrivially refuted by pointing out that HN readers are not "the left" and that the original assertion refers to "decades" of this behavior. How soft does one have to be to consider "downvoting" a punishment?
- MagicMoonlight 2y ago[flagged]
- UberFly 2y agoWith it's massive history of bias and credibility issues, I don't trust the source of this story. Sorry.
- chasing 2y agoDoesn't matter. It's a propaganda tool. Go look at Twitter: It's full of right-wingers latching onto obviously false information "proving" some sort of Trump/Musk narrative. Which then gets sanitized into news articles and media pieces. Which then becomes the reason why people who live in information deserts vote against their own interests, their communities interests, and general common sense.
- TypingOutBugs 2y agoTbf, saying they did cut “some billions” as a group of unpaid or low paid 20-somethings is fantastic returns
- owl_vision 2y agoThis "wall-of-receipt" data does not meet the standards of the government's data communication requirements. It is not transparent, inaccurate and many difficulties are added to make it available to the public. Anyone thought of a petition to request and meet the standards?
- thom 2y agoEven if government were like a tech startup, you shouldn’t run it like a stupid one. https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you-should-never-do-part-i/ https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you-should-...
- sebastianconcpt 2y agoDiscussing the correctness in the immoral use of public money is the wrong discussion to have. You don't try play chess with a parasite. You deparasitize a patient and then do any next thing you need to do.
- drawkward 2y agoOur system is based on laws, not morals.
- sebastianconcpt 2y agoAnd is Achilles heel: to infiltrate the country's bureaucratic corpus (to make system design decisions by unelected experts that if ideology driven the population has no defense against) and infiltrate the judiciary. If you have the supreme court in one ideology aisle alone, the population have zero defense against the problem of these subjects secretly executing a pact of conspiracy against their people. Zero. It's game over. This is Brazil today, by the way. The U.S. got just saved of having that same fate.
- ave_b_2011 2y agoI’m sorry. Just one thing to clear up. Are you saying that the public at large that pays taxes are the parasite? Veterans seeing the doctor at their VA location are parasites? Is the clean air and clean water we drink, seat belt laws, cancer research, etc. immoral? I’m not following what you’re saying at all.
- sebastianconcpt 2y agoNo, the public at large has the parasite. The bureaucratic muscle of the country is parasitized (by "low and high calories" ideology-driven subversives in disguise advancing a sort of religious war against wester-civilization values).
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- 1970-01-01 2y agoDOGE logistics is simply 'It became necessary to destroy the budget to save it.'
- chriscrisby 2y agoTo sum up this article, the Government is so big in inefficient that it’ll costs too much money to cut back on spending.
- anoxor 2y agoI like that the focus is on the issues with the disruptors that have been running for a few weeks, not the egregious spending for decades.
- _DeadFred_ 2y agoThis disruption are not about spending though. In their own words what it is about: "We want the bureaucrats to be traumatically affected. When they wake up in the morning, we want them to not want to go to work" https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/11/books/review/administrative-state-trump-bannon.html https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/11/books/review/administrati...
- wsve 2y agoThis is exactly right. DOGE deserves no praise. Their goal is not to cut spending to bring money back to the people. Their goal is to gut the government itself and make it ineffective in improving people's lives. They don't actually care whether these departments are "wasteful", and anyone who thinks they do has bought and drunk the snake oil.
- NotGMan 2y agoThe trashing of a (hopefully) dying octopus.
- DFHippie 2y agoThat egregious spending bears a family resemblance to the malfeasance that cost Trump the 2020 election and Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.
- user9999999999 2y agodestroying institutions is the plan. it's a cynical party. the only time "build" is mentioned is border walls. unfortunately "great" countries aren't BUILT on fear and cynicism.
- _heimdall 2y agoI'm still not sold on this. I can't yet distinguish if the plan is to get rid of institutions or to gut what's their and rebuild it how the want it. We may not end up with a smaller government, just a different one.
- EasyMark 2y agoAll you have to do is read project 2025 and you will know all their plans and reasoning for Stage 1 of fascism
- Master_Odin 2y agoThe Republican plan for the federal government for decades has been to try to kneecap various agencies and departments so fully that they can't function well, go "look how poorly they operate! Time to close it down and let private sector handle it!"
- chneu 2y agoIt's called Starve The Beast
- metadat 2y agoLots of interesting reading linked from the wiki page: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starve_the_beast https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starve_the_beast
- _heimdall 2y agoThat wouldn't be the goal though, just the means to their end. The goal would have to be shrinking the government, for example, or to move authority out to the private sector. The entire party is psychos wanting to kneecap departments just to watch them bleed.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- scottmcdoge 2y ago[flagged]
- dang 2y agoHN has had NYT articles from the beginning: Spam stock tips work - for spammers - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26 - Oct 2006 You aren't going to get far with this community arguing that we should ban nytimes.com. What you (i.e. anyone who cares about this) should do instead is find more substantive, more interesting, and hopefully more neutral articles analyzing the same things, and submit them to HN instead. I can't say I've seen very many of these lately, but presumably some exist.
- seivan 2y ago[flagged]
- dang 2y agoYou guys are much too tendentious about this and it weakens your case. The reason nytimes.com isn't banned on HN is because it produces threads like these, which are obviously good HN material: Can you lose your native tongue? (2024) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43093360 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43093360 - Feb 2025 (171 comments) The legacy of lies in Alzheimer's science - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42910829 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42910829 - Feb 2025 (210 comments) Japan's original decluttering guru (no, not that one) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42742396 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42742396 - Jan 2025 (63 comments) How saffron became an American cash crop - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42582352 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42582352 - Jan 2025 (61 comments) Dungeons and Dragons rolls the dice with new rules about identity - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42549425 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42549425 - Dec 2024 (182 comments) Insects rely on sounds made by vegetation to guide reproduction - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42353066 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42353066 - Dec 2024 (188 comments) Yes, it ‘looks like a duck,’ but carriers like the new USPS mail truck - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42249545 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42249545 - Nov 2024 (144 comments) The Rise of Malört, an Unexpected Midwest princess - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42194355 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42194355 - Nov 2024 (146 comments) A 132-Year-Old Message in a Bottle in a Scottish Lighthouse - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42179850 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42179850 - Nov 2024 (55 comments) A Chopin waltz unearthed after nearly 200 years - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41961866 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41961866 - Oct 2024 (130 comments) Yes, NYT is tendentious on certain topics in its own right, and in some of those cases, it would be good if HN had more neutral reports to discuss. But if users don't submit them, what can we do?
- phgn 2y agohttps://archive.is/YSlkm https://archive.is/YSlkm
- belter 2y ago[dead]
- nemo44x 2y ago[flagged]
- doom2 2y agoIs it transparent? Elon got angry when people merely listed the names of some DOGE employees. I still don't think we know the full list of people working under him (and according to court filings, the government claims he isn't even the administrator of DOGE but can't name who is). We also won't be able to get access to DOGE records until well after Trump is out of office [1]. That doesn't sound like maximal transparency to me. [1] https://www.businessinsider.com/musk-doge-records-public-information-foia-presidential-records-act-2025-2 https://www.businessinsider.com/musk-doge-records-public-inf...
- nemo44x 2y agoI’m reading a NYT article about outcomes they’ve claimed to create, looks pretty transparent. There’s lots of things about organizations, especially government orgs, that aren’t public info. Naming the employees would create stochastic terror opportunities, for instance. Individual contributors should be able to work without being harassed or worse. The management gives the media daily opportunities to ask questions.
- TomK32 2y agoWe don't even know what DOGE is and whether Musk is running it. LeagleEagle hasn't a clue[1], the courts are slow at finding out and the Republicans in Congress are useless at what Congress is supposed to do. Musk is overstepping even the powers of the president but I don't see anyone trying to sue him and Trump for treason. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihvSwJT0rLU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ihvSwJT0rLU
- turtlesdown11 2y ago> but I don't see anyone trying to sue him and Trump for treason That would be...interesting... but there is no standing for suing individuals for "treason" as far as I am aware. The inmates run the asylum.
- Test2123 2y ago[flagged]
- gcnnbdff 2y ago[dead]
- MisterKent 2y agoTwo points that are often missed: 1. Perfectly tracking every dollar is more expensive than having some slack in the system. There's an optimal amount, at least from an overall value perspective. 2. We spend too much, and both sides of the aisle repeatedly blocked attempts to curb spending for literal decades while our debt got higher. That's how someone doing something coming in with a hatchet and no plan to build gets cheered instead of booed by a large percentage of the populace. The problem Americans have with the political system has roots on Webers concept of politics as a vocation.
- JeremyNT 2y ago2) is questionable. Most of the budget is spent maintaining global hegemony through military dominance. Whatever inefficiencies that exist on the civil side are nearly irrelevant.
- MisterKent 2y agoI think many who are okay with our civil spend may take issue with our military spend. I have rarely encountered anyone who thinks the government isn't overspending. And nobody ever agrees on how we should be spending the money. I realize the comment above paints me as a conservative, I assure you I am not. However, I guess I can at least sympathize with how we got here (DOGE being acceptable). And from that I blame almost everyone in politics and every person tangentially related to those in politics.
- jfengel 2y agoA lot of people think they government isn't overspending. They're the bond buyers, who loan the US government money at remarkably low interest rates. That's a true market signal, regardless of what people tell pollsters. Everyone would love to spend less money on other people's priorities. But as a whole, the bond market thinks the spending is ok, even if no individual will say so.
- Fade_Dance 2y ago
- ObscureMind 2y ago[flagged]
- belter 2y agoThe article is very clear and references the DOGE site. Your point seems to be that truth depends on packaging the context it’s served in. This is a classic post-truth move: Distracting from the substance by debating the style. It’s a diversion, not a logical argument. When truth is pushed to the background in favor of delivery, it’s no longer about facts, but about framing those facts to fit an agenda. You're suggesting that truth's value hinges on its presentation...A classic post-truth deflection that shifts attention from substance to style. In proper logic, a fact remains true regardless of its packaging.
- ObscureMind 2y ago[flagged]
- belter 2y ago> - Can you independently verify the accuracy of the data presented? You can go to the DOGE site and also ask for more transparency. Something many argue is now impossible since they have write access to government records. > - Are the errors due to the data itself being wrong, or are the underlying sources unreliable? > - Do these errors appear to be the result of intentional bias, or are they reasonable mistakes? > - Ultimately, do these issues undermine the credibility of DOGE as a trustworthy source? The article discusses all this.
- kemotep 2y agoYou can double check everything at doge.gov it’s pretty easy to see the errors they are talking about.
- ObscureMind 2y ago[flagged]
- roenxi 2y agoIf anyone has been involved in any sort of internal data analytics this is basically what is expected to happen. Data that is used in a new way tends to turn up all sorts of limitations and soft points. Trump, Musk, etc should have been (read: probably were) well aware this was coming; for what it is worth they've surely seen it a few times in business life. That being said, I doubt it is much of a factor. The strategy of hitting fast & hard is to bypass the unreliable data by triggering screams from the areas that are most important. In some sense, anticipating this revelation is why the strategy is chosen in the first place. Trying to do massive cuts slowly and carefully gets a few months in to the project then crumbles under the weight of unreliable data and analysis paralysis.
- watwut 2y ago[flagged]
- dang 2y agoPlease don't cross into personal attack.
- viraptor 2y ago> hitting fast & hard is to bypass the unreliable data by triggering screams from the areas that are most important This works for companies which can risk some debt and restructure and maybe getting better. Worst case they'll go bankrupt. In this case the screams after mistakes will be literal screams of people dying.
- TomK32 2y agoHitting fast & hard is not the legal way to do it. Congress has allocated the money and the President can't just stop spending it. You also ignore the human aspect, firing people in the most disrespectful way, with just single sentences, will hurt the trust in the government as a workplace for a long time. Good government needs good workers who trust the government.
- torlok 2y agoWhy is this flagged? Even if the comment section isn't up to standards, the article should be relevant to everybody.
- cluckindan 2y ago[flagged]
- hagbard_c 2y ago[flagged]
- watwut 2y agoDemocrats never done anything comparable. So, no. There is no symmetry here.
- FireBeyond 2y agoLet's not act like you were somehow forced to read the comments to a thread titled "DOGE's only public ledger is riddled with mistakes" and whine that it really needs a politics tag so you don't accidentally stumble across it. What were you expecting, after wading half way through the comments?
- hagbard_c 2y agoI was expecting for these political posts to be treated the same as other political posts, i.e. shut down due to them being off-topic for this site. Alternatively I'd expect the 'no politics' rule (yes, rule) to be either restated as 'Bay Area politics welcome, other politics off-topic' (/s) or 'politics welcome, tag title [politics]' (like PDF's are tagged) or 'politics welcome, thread will be tagged' or something along those lines. What's good for the goose is good for the gander after all.
- dang 2y agoI've been posting a lot about this lately. Here are some recent posts: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43130700 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43130700 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43130063 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43130063 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43093299 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43093299 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43051836 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43051836 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42978389 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42978389 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42911011 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42911011 If you (or anyone) will read some of those and follow some of the links in them, you should get answers to all the common questions about this. If, after that, you have a question that hasn't been answered, I'd be happy to take a crack at it. (Plus I'd like to know what it is! It's been a while since I've heard a new one.)
- romaaeterna 2y agoUS debt is 124% of GDP. That's not as high as UK debt after WWII, 270%, which impoverished the country that had been at the top of the world. But combined with an aging population that has more people than ever hailing from the historically low-achievement global south, you can expect some standard of living adjustment to occur. Your grandparents had a house by your age, and the economic ability to raise a family. You get to slave for an apartment and a wife who works for another man. Historically, there were names for that economic arrangement and the class of people who were condemned to it. That Trump I and Biden did not have an effort like DOGE (which does not have Congressional support and therefore should not yet be enough to give serious people hope) shows how fundamentally unserious both of those administrations were. I hope that Musk can find a way to make it successful somehow. But if he does, it will break 1000x the number of eggs that you've seen him breaking so far.
- chillingeffect 2y agoAlmost every presidency has taken more or less responisble effors to minimize spending. But they werent aimed at people who had prosecuted those in power, targetted at regulation agencies for the president's oligarch cronies, racially targetted, or driven by outsiders with no experience: Initiated under President Jimmy Carter in 1977, Zero-Based Budgeting (ZBB) required agencies to justify their budgets from scratch rather than just adjusting from the previous year. President Ronald Reagan pushed for privatization, deregulation, and reduced federal spending. The Grace Commission (1982-1984), led by businessman J. Peter Grace, was tasked with identifying inefficiencies in government. In 1993, President Bill Clinton launched the National Performance Review (later renamed the National Partnership for Reinventing Government), led by Vice President Al Gore. The NPR aimed to make government "work better and cost less" by cutting red tape, streamlining bureaucracy, and increasing customer service. Key successes included shifting more government services online, consolidating purchasing, and reducing federal workforce size. Launched by President George W. Bush in 2001, the President’s Management Agenda (PMA) focused on: Strategic management of human capital Competitive sourcing (increasing private-sector competition for government contracts) Financial performance improvements E-Government expansion (improving federal websites and online services) Budget and performance integration 2010s: DATA Act & Digital Transformation President Barack Obama signed the DATA Act (2014), which aimed to improve transparency and accountability in government spending. Obama also created the U.S. Digital Service (USDS) and 18F, teams dedicated to modernizing government technology. The Trump administration’s PMA (2018) emphasized IT modernization, data transparency, and a shift to "shared services", where multiple agencies use the same administrative systems. The Biden administration has continued these efforts, focusing on AI, cybersecurity, and digital transformation, as well as improving citizen-facing services like healthcare and tax processing.
- wonkeydonkey 2y ago[flagged]
- wonkeydonkey84 2y ago[flagged]
- cuuupid 2y agoI think impartial observers have not spent time in actual government bureaucracy. Basically everything will seem like “they’re cutting something important!” Or “they’re stopping critical research!” because every government contract needs justification; so naturally they will all sound good. The data and accounting itself is such bad quality in all cases that it is impossible to be perfect at this; there are entire industries dedicated to simply analyzing and tracking contracts and spending. None of them are above ~90% accurate. Many “analysts” born over the last couple weeks are talking about things they know nothing about; for example measuring savings off calls on BPAs or IDIQs is silly because a call = spent money. You cannot save money you have already spent, but you can stop the vehicle. I’m not saying DOGE is definitively good or even that they are going to actually accomplish their mission (probably their cuts will become a piggy bank that gets raided by OTA’s at the end of the fiscal year). But it is absolutely true that the federal government is endlessly wasteful; it’s insane watching everyone around me get gaslit into thinking the government is actually efficient. What is on paper for government contracts is totally different from reality. Most of these programs accomplish nothing, are totally un-utilized, filled with employees who literally do not show up to work. I could write a novel with examples but here are some notable anecdotes: - Once, I built an intelligence solution for a large-ish intelligence program within a civil agency. After 6 months it was not used once but cost the government a cool ~12M$. Only after a full year did the program leadership finally take a look and discover, wait a second, none of these people have worked more than a week total in the past year. Only half got laid off, the rest are still gainfully employed elsewhere in the government. Many such cases! - I’ll probably get skewered for saying this here but, let’s talk about the defense tech darling Palantir. Of all of Palantir’s contracts, only about 5% (~10) have more than 100 users. Average case is 10-20 total users, 1-2 weekly active users. Several contracts that have never had a single user. All expensive contracts (10M+), mostly building basic internal tools that replace Sharepoint. On paper all of these contracts sound amazing, they make for great resume filler as well. This is what your tax dollars are being used for! - Dozens of cases of the government spending on “XYZ tool” that sounds super critical. In reality they are paying $12M for a postgres database and an extremely basic data entry UI on top. Also, I can’t believe I am about to defend Sharepoint, but realistically something like tracking 10 SIM cards can go in an excel spreadsheet and doesn’t need a $12M “inventory tool.” - Many cases of projects investigating bird flu in depth and tracking its spread as early as 2022. You would think this is critical with bird flu being a thing right now; however none of these $20M+ contracts have accomplished much at all. You have to understand bureaucrats behave like Google PMs. They essentially are chasing a promotion that comes with amassing and utilizing a large budget and having a bunch of reports doing the same. The only way to go from GS-12 to GS-13 to GS-14 to GS-15 is just to spend recklessly. They are experts at justifying their budget and navigating internal hierarchies. However bad your experience with corporate politics, know that government is 100x worse. (Disclaimer: “government” above refers to civil, exclusive of DoD)
- TomK32 2y agoWhy is this flagged?
- computerthings 2y ago[flagged]
- dang 2y agoSince I just recently asked you to stop posting unsubstantive flamebait and you've continued to do it non-stop, I've banned this account. Please don't create accounts to break HN's rules with. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html p.s. I suppose I'd better add that (1) no, this has nothing to do with your political views, and (2) yes, we ban accounts who are doing the same thing with different politics. Oh and (3) yes, if other accounts keep doing this after we ask them to stop, we'll end up banning them as well. Macro trends notwithstanding (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&query=macro%20trends%20immune%20by%3Adang&sort=byDate&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...), the amount of low-quality nastiness that HN has been hosting lately is a serious problem and we're not going to let it continue.
- computerthings 2y agoYou also said this https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43113282 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43113282 breaks site guidelines. You just call things "flamebait" and that's that. > no, this has nothing to do with your political views Who believes that at this point? Speak up. > Please don't create accounts to break HN's rules with. If you want to order me to tolerate the fascism apologists has been having a field day on this site since over a month, you have to say that to my face. You do not have the personal capital or credibility to say "please". You made your bed, you sided with the anonymous, hooded executioners; we heard it the first time, now STFU already! And I'll speak my mind throttled to the showdead crowd, and if you make that impossible, of course I'll make new accounts. I'll make fake websites to have fake emails at JUST to not take orders from you.
- 2y ago