There are those people who regularly say that government should operate like a business, but there is no business that would operate the way the Trump-Musk slash and burn approach is working in the U.S. government.

It is equal parts ineptitude, callousness, chaos, and egotism, and it is anathema to being businesslike.

Back when Bill Morris was Shelby County Mayor, harsh budgetary challenges one year meant that there would have to be a reduction in workforce.  County commissioners wanted an across-the-board 10% cut in every department’s budget but Mayor Morris resisted.

He called it lazy man budgeting and that treating all services as the same without regard to which affected the public most was shortsighted and shirked management responsibilities.  In the end, he set up a process that determined how many employees would be fired and required each department to evaluate its employees.   

It would have been simpler and quicker to hack away 10% of employees in every department and report mission accomplished.  But in the end, the other way was more logical, each person’s job duties were analyzed, and every employee set to be released was given help finding new jobs.

It was the antithesis of what is taking place today in Washington, D.C., where Musk poses with a chainsaw to illustrate the way he approaches the federal government.  There is no systematic analysis of essential jobs and individual evaluation of federal workers, there is only the vilification of all government workers as useless and lazy accompanied by childish posturing and infantile social media insults.

The 10% Principle

There’s a belief held by many CEOs that it is generally possible to eliminate the 10% of employees that are low-performing without affecting a company’s overall effectiveness.

It’s called the 20-70-10 model.  Business consultants warn that it risks a negative impact on company morale and sometimes setting the 10% as an inflexible goal can actually end up removing employees that fall in the 70%.  

And yet, even when layoffs are required from economic conditions or falling profits, they call for empathy and for a careful analysis of each person to determine responsibilities and potential impact of eliminating the person from departmental processes.

That’s how high-functioning, smart CEOs do it. 

Then there is Elon Musk and Donald Trump and DOGE. 

American Politics At Its Worst

With Musk and Trump, there are indiscriminate firings, there are entire categories of federal workers kicked off their jobs, and there are immature taunts and smears threatening anyone who chooses to defend their decision to serve the public as an employee in the federal government or to question the haphazard process now under way.

It is being done with a meat axe and done so clumsily that people with the nuclear codes are told to go home, FAA workers are fired despite recent airplane crashes, people conducting biomedical research into disease have their jobs eliminated, disabled veterans are removed from jobs serving their comrades, people working on bird flu were given their notice, and all in all, job performance is ignored in favor of immediacy and political oaths of loyalty,

The work is so incompetently done that DOGE has been forced to call back some essential workers that were sacked by this unbusinesslike process.  Contrary to the immature inside joke that inspired the DOGE name, the Department of Government Efficiency is doing more to create inefficiency than anything in the modern history of the U.S. government. 

And when it is accompanied by a constant barrage of the Big Lie, it promises to create long-term damage to federal services.

A Blizzard of Lies

This anti-democracy group gives new meaning to the old saying: you know they’re lying because their lips are moving.

When they were caught accessing confidential data, we were told the DOGE staff had “read only” privileges, a claim that was quickly proven to be a lie.  In fact, one person had what was called “god access” to the data.

Musk and his minions claim they have cut $55 billion but the math is so error-filled, it would embarrass a high school student.  There are outdated data, contracts whose terms are misstated, reckless use of government payment systems, and calculations that even included contracts ended in the Biden Administration.

It has triple-counted a $655 million USAID contract.  It claimed an $88 billion savings with an ICE contract when it was actually $88 million.  It claimed $232 million savings in Social Security information technology when it was actually $560,000.  It claimed $100 million in Agriculture Department waste but counted a $25 million contract four times.  It listed an NIH contract at $95.3 million but it actually was $1.1 million.  It claimed that five million Social Security checks are mailed to people older than 140 because it didn’t take the time to learn how the legacy system works. It made the laughable claim that $50 million was spent for condoms for Hamas and even after admitting it was not true went ahead and said it was $100 million.

Attacking American Institutions

By the time the facts are corrected – with Musk admitting that he doesn’t always get the facts right – DOGE and the White House press office have moved on to their next lie.  With each lie amplified by X and DOGE website, it’s impossible for even the news media to fact check in real time.

But because they try to do so, they are smeared as “enemies of the people,” targeted by the Trump Administration, and sued for laughable claims of defamation.  But no one in the media is laughing.  Trump et al do not really care if they win because the real purpose is to force outlets to spend considerable money defending themselves and to fear that federal agencies will be turned loose to target them. 

For decades, right wing extremists have been intent on undermining the underpinnings of American institutions and freedom of the press has been at the top of the list. 

And it has worked to the point that the fundamental foundation of government – checks and balances – are now at risk as Congressional Republicans (think Memphian David Kustoff) turn a blind eye to their Constitutional obligations in exchange for decimating the government they were elected to serve and preserve.

If that continues, it is impossible to comprehend the damage being done to American democracy.

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