Tag: DOGE

What Happened To DOGE?

For months after Donny took office and tagged in Elmo to lighten the government of personnel the media was fixated on his movement and his actions….then Elmo blew out of town after creating governmental chaos and the reports lessened and then seemingly to disappear.

So how was DOGE doing at making government lighter?

Good question that needs a good answer.

Elom promised to save the country $2 trillion.

That target quickly dropped to $1 trillion. Then in April, Musk started intimating that the savings would only be in the region of $150 billion, making it clear to all but his most diehard supporters that DOGE was failing on its own terms — even going by its own dubious estimates of its progress.

Now, it’s looking like those purported “savings” are somehow even more pitiful than once believed.

A new investigation by Politico found that of the $52.8 billion that DOGE claims it’s saved by cancelling federal contracts through July, its actual savings were closer to a paltry $1.4 billion — which is barely two percent of what it’s boasting to the public.

The books, it seems, have been well and truly cooked — but how? According to Politico, DOGE is using the maximum spending possible allocated for some of the 10,000 contracts it axed as of last month, a “ceiling value” that’s often way higher than what the government ends up spending.

“That’s the equivalent of basically taking out a credit card with a $20,000 credit limit, cancelling it and then saying, ‘I’ve just saved $20,000,'” Jessica Tillipman, associate dean for government procurement law studies at George Washington University Law School, told Politico. “Anything that’s been said publicly about [DOGE’s] savings is meaningless.”

DOGE took a “move fast and break things,” take-no-prisoners approach to gutting the federal government. It gleefully pushed for firing tens if not hundreds of thousands of federal employees, demanded access to sensitive and private data, hollowed out the Social Security Administration, and targeted funds for science, education, and healthcare.

https://futurism.com/elon-musk-doge-even-more-failure

So the stats are out and DOGE was NOT nearly as effective as promised….to be real it was a dismal failure.

Like many of the campaign promises many things are falling way short of their promise….but that is okay for Donny is taking revenge on all the people and groups that have defied him in the past…..and is not that what a president is suppose to do instead of putting the country on a positive footing?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

The Animals Turn On Each Other

Since Musk (Elmo) left the government he has been taking pot shots at Donny and now Donny has made his all telling statement about Elmo….Donny threatens to turn DOGE onto Elmo….

The Elon Musk-President Trump feud appears to be back on. After Musk lashed out at Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill’ on Monday, threatening to form a new political party if it passed, Trump fired back with a post on Truth Social early Tuesday. He suggested that the Department of Government Efficiency, formerly led by Musk, should take a look at the subsidies the billionaire’s company receives, reports Reuters.

  • “Elon Musk knew, long before he so strongly Endorsed me for President, that I was strongly against the EV Mandate,” Trump wrote. “It is ridiculous, and was always a major part of my campaign. Electric cars are fine, but not everyone should be forced to own one. Elon may get more subsidy than any human being in history, by far, and without subsidies, Elon would probably have to close up shop and head back home to South Africa. No more Rocket launches, Satellites, or Electric Car Production, and our Country would save a FORTUNE. Perhaps we should have DOGE take a good, hard, look at this? BIG MONEY TO BE SAVED!”
  • In a post on X, Musk replied, I am literally saying CUT IT ALL. Now.” In earlier posts, he called the spending and tax cuts bill “insane” and said lawmakers who “campaigned on reducing government spending and then immediately voted for the biggest debt increase in history” will “lose their primary next year if it is the last thing I do on this Earth.”
  • When Trump and Musk clashed over the bill in early June, Trump said the easiest way for the government to save money would be to “terminate Elon’s Governmental Subsidies and Contracts.” Musk countered that while it was “very unfair” for the bill to cut EV and solar incentives without touching oil and gas subsidies, he was was more upset about the bill’s “MOUNTAIN of DISGUSTING PORK.

I love it when the pricks turn on one another…..

I await the further developments….this could be the story of the years so far….at least it has the makings of a good slap fight.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Where’s Elmo?

There has been an eerie absence from the spotlight by Donny’s favorite smug a/hole, Musk, the guru of DOGE.

So the question is….where’s Elmo?

Elon Musk’s time as a special government employee has officially come to an end, a White House official tells NBC News. The billionaire, who had recently pledged to pay more attention to the actual companies he runs, started offboarding from his role in the Trump administration Wednesday—the day after he publicly split with President Trump over the president’s so-called “big, beautiful bill.” Special government employees are typically allowed to work up to 130 days in a calendar year, and Musk had been in his role with the Department of Government Efficiency for more than 114. The White House has not yet publicly commented on his departure.

Musk did address his exit on X, thanking Trump “for the opportunity to reduce wasteful spending” and saying the “DOGE mission” would “only strengthen over time as it becomes a way of life throughout the government,” but the New York Times reports that Musk had gone from calling himself Trump’s “first buddy” to seeming “disillusioned” and “distanced” from the president. In addition to his complaint about the spending bill, which he claimed would make the national deficit worse, he’s also recently complained about a deal for an AI data center in the Middle East that went to a rival company. White House officials, however, insist Musk and Trump remain on good terms.

In an interview with the Washington Post on Tuesday, Musk complained about how hard he found it to get things done in Washington, DC, (DOGE famously has not saved the federal government anywhere near the promised trillions) and claimed the department became a “whipping boy,” getting blamed for anything that went wrong in the federal government.

Unfortunately he did not, as I had hoped, fall off the face of the world but instead I would imagine that he will retire to his city in Texas and count the billions because of his tenure with Donny has made him…..and probably sit and jerk-off over the contracts his firms will now be given and the even more billions he will get.

All in all his tenure in the Donny sphere has been very profitable and after all that is the main reason he pretended to serve this country.

One smug bastard down and about 500 more to go….let the work begin!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

All That Social Security Fraud

Just recently DOGE and Donny have been pushing the idea to his idiot supporters about all the fraud within the Social Security system…..at one point I believe someone said there could be millions of fraudsters out there.

Damn!  That is a bunch!

But unfortunately it is just another Donny tactic….make shit up.

The rest of the story…..

It’s long been clear that Social Security fraud is minuscule, with an inspector general report published last year estimating that just 0.84% of Social Security benefits paid out between 2015 and 2022 were dispensed improperly—and even those improper payments were not necessarily fraudulent.

The new reporting out Thursday bolstered warnings that the Trump administration’s hunt for fraud is a mere pretext for slashing Social Security benefits and weakening the program.

“Turns out there ISN’T rampant Social Security fraud, but Elon’s witch hunt, driven by his insane conspiracy theories, IS keeping seniors from getting their benefits as quickly as they should be,” Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) wrote on social media. “THIS is Republican governing: hunting for nonexistent fraud while breaking Social Security.

Frank Bisignano, the newly confirmed SSA administrator, has close ties to Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency and has defended the president’s false claim that tens of millions of “dead” people are receiving Social Security benefits.

…

An internal Trump administration document reportedly shows that anti-fraud checks recently installed at the Social Security agency have found just two cases of potentially improper benefit claims out of more than 110,000—a rate of 0.0018%.

The documents, first reported Thursday by Nextgov/FCW, further undercut President Donald Trump and billionaire Elon Musk’s narrative that Social Security is brimming with fraud. Musk falsely claimed in March that “40% of the calls into Social Security were fraudulent.”

The anti-fraud checks for Social Security have been applied only to benefit claims made over the phone. According to the internal document, “No significant fraud has been detected from the flagged cases.” Earlier this year, amid widespread outrage, the Social Security Administration (SSA) walked back a proposal to scrap many of its phone-based benefit claim services.

(commondreams.org)

Please stop listening to the lies and bullshit coming from the mouths of the idiots in power….all this crap is so they can find an excuse to cut SS benefits to you….and you eat the manure up….can’t fix stupid!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

 

Is This The End Of Empathy?

Have we lost the loving feeling?

2025 has illustrated that the incoming administration has lost all empathy for the citizens and the nation as a whole.

Empathy is not sympathy….

Empathy is shown in how much compassion and understanding we can give to another. ….while Sympathy is more of a feeling of pity for another.

Short and simple definitions.

The thugs in the GOP and now the lackeys in the new administration are illustrating the lack on empathy.

The following is an editorial printed in the The Week magazine.

Kindness is so over. Since Donald Trump re-entered the White House, it has become apparent that America is not simply moving past the excesses of progressivism — the compulsory stating of pronouns, the hawking of anti-racism books for babies, the pretending that “Emilia Pérez” is a good movie — but beyond the idea that it’s good to care for others at all.

On social media, people have rejoiced at the slashing of U.S. food aid and medicine for people suffering genocide and famine. “Frankly at this point out of f—s to give about Sudanese babies,” read one post that appeared on my X timeline. Vice President J.D. Vance has invoked medieval Catholic theology to justify the shuttering of borders to asylum seekers, saying we have a moral obligation to prioritize our nearest and dearest over strangers. Never mind that do-gooding parable of the Good Samaritan stuff.

https://theweek.com/politics/the-end-of-empathy

So far the efforts from DOGE is not sitting well with some Americans….

A whopping 49 percent of respondents said they disapproved of the “job that Elon Musk is doing within the federal government,” while only 34 approved. The degree of animosity shouldn’t be understated either, with 41 percent “strongly” disapproving, while only eight percent “somewhat” disapproved.

When asked about Musk shutting down “federal government programs that he decides are unnecessary,” 52 percent of all respondents disapproved, while only 26 percent approved.

But their feelings of approval or disapproval mean nothing to the power mad sycophants.

Americans use to have empathy for their fellow Americans….but those days are gone it is becoming ‘us against them’….and it is having a negative effect on our society….

We need to rediscover our empathy….it is as simple as that.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Will Elmo Truly Depart? (DOGE)

The whole country is well aware that the Depart of Governmental Eradication (DOGE) (the term was from my friend and fellow blogger John at JR Liming Blog) we know that government cuts are running deep…..some were possibly necessary but the hard ones effect you and your family the most.

There is a report traveling around the media circus that Elmo will soon depart the scene….

Companies including Tesla, SpaceX, and Neuralink might soon be getting more attention from their CEO. Politico, citing “three Trump insiders,” reported Wednesday that President Trump recently told his inner circle, including Cabinet members, that Musk would soon be stepping back from his role in the administration. In a post on X, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt denied that the news was a “scoop,” saying Musk and Trump have both publicly stated “that Elon will depart from public service as a special government employee when his incredible work at DOGE is complete.” It had been widely rumored that Musk would be staying in the administration for a lot longer, ABC News reports.

According to Politico, Trump is pleased with Musk’s work, but some of the president’s allies inside and outside the administration are “frustrated with his unpredictability and increasingly view the billionaire as a political liability.” In the Wisconsin Supreme Court race, nobody “expended more political capital” than Musk, “with the possible exception of the candidates,” the New York Times notes. But Trump began talking about a Musk exit well before Tuesday’s vote and discussed his return to the private sector at a Cabinet meeting last week, sources tell outlets including NBC News.

On Monday, Trump said Musk has a “big company to run, and so at some point, he’s going to be going back.” Musk has also suggested he could be leaving his role in government in the near future. During a Fox News interview last week, host Bret Baier asked Musk whether he plans to stay beyond the 130 days this year permitted under his “special government employee” status, during which he’s exempt from certain ethics and conflict-of-interest rules. Musk replied: “I think we will have accomplished most of the work required to reduce the deficit by $1 trillion within that timeframe.” The 130 days will be up in May—or July, if only weekdays are counted—but Politico’s sources say Musk is expected to have an informal role as an occasional White House adviser long after that.

You mean that smug piece of crap will depart?

Here is the article in Politico…..

Musk’s looming exit comes as some Trump administration insiders and many outside allies have become frustrated with his unpredictability and increasingly view the billionaire as a political liability, a dynamic that was thrown into stark relief Tuesday when a conservative judge Musk vocally supported lost his bid for a Wisconsin Supreme Court seat by 10 points.

It also represents a shift in the Trump-Musk relationship from a month ago, when White House officials and allies were predicting Musk was “here to stay” and that Trump would find a way to blow past the 130-day time limit.

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2025/04/02/trump-musk-leaving-political-liability-00265784

I guess he has sufficiently eliminated all the competition for his companies….leaving the door open for him to scam and steal billions more for his smug ass.

This is great news, hopefully, for the bastard should leave  he really should have never there.

But what will it mean if and when this tool departs to the Little Donny sphere?

What will it mean for us, the average American?

What will Donny do without someone to run cover while he tees off?

I say about time and do not wish this prick any success now or ever.

Whatcha gotta say?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Last Week At The Sh*t Show–02Mar25

Another beautiful Sunday here in the Deep South…..what better time than now to drop some under reported news your way?

During the early days of the Trump Administration lots has been happening but not all of the ‘progress’ (for lack of a better more civil word) so IST has decided to pass on those subjects that need to be said.

To begin with there is DOGE and its fearless leader, Elmo….his tactics are popular with His Highness but not so much elsewhere….

Unelected White House budget slasher and richest man in the world Elon Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency has ripped through the federal government like a bull in a china shop.

The billionaire’s hodge-podge team of underqualified 20-somethings — and at least one literal teenager — have already ripped up countless government contracts and fired thousands of federal employees — only to rehire those who were in charge of nuclear security and protecting the US from a looming bird flu crisis.

It’s a spectacular level of incompetence that has Americans increasingly furious, as a new Washington Post-Ipsos poll shows.

A whopping 49 percent of respondents said they disapproved of the “job that Elon Musk is doing within the federal government,” while only 34 approved. The degree of animosity shouldn’t be understated either, with 41 percent “strongly” disapproving, while only eight percent “somewhat” disapproved.

https://futurism.com/new-poll-americans-increasingly-disgusted-elon-musk

Staying with DOGE….this agency is promised to save the taxpayer billions…..and so far they are a bit short from all the extreme actions they have taken….

Donald Trump and Elon Musk claim they’re saving billions through the Department of Government Efficiency’s mass purge of federal bureaucracy, but government spending has actually gone up since Inauguration Day.

Through the Department of Government Efficiency, Elon Musk has fired over 20,000 federal workers and gutted a number of federal agencies, most notably the U.S. Agency for International Development, which spent $42 billion in 2023. The cuts are part of Musk’s goal to reduce the federal deficit by $1 trillion by 2026, a likely impossible feat, especially given the administration’s newly revealed spending habits.

Unsurprisingly, many of DOGE’s claims have been exaggerated or fraudulent. The department claimed to have cut an $8 billion ICE contract—the real amount was $8 million, The New York Times reported. An analysis from The Washington Post found that hundreds of contracts DOGE claimed to cancel were actually already finished, resulting in absolutely zero savings.

(newrepublic.com)

Trump’s downsizing….

Federal agencies must develop plans to eliminate employee positions, according to a memo distributed Wednesday by President Trump’s administration that sets in motion what could become a sweeping realignment of the American government. The memo expands the Republican president’s effort to downsize the federal workforce, which he has described as an impediment to his agenda. Thousands of probationary employees have already been fired, and now his administration is turning its attention to career officials with civil service protection. More from the AP, which notes law enforcement, national security, public safety, military positions, and US Postal Service positions are exempt:

  • From the memo: “The federal government is costly, inefficient, and deeply in debt. At the same time, it is not producing results for the American public. Instead, tax dollars are being siphoned off to fund unproductive and unnecessary programs that benefit radical interest groups while hurting hard-working American citizens.”
  • One criticism: Kevin Owen, an employment lawyer who represents federal workers, compared the administration’s initiative to the kind of disruptions that are caused by government shutdowns during congressional budget standoffs. “This looks like a plan for a significant and shocking reduction of the federal workforce that I don’t think the American people are prepared for,” Owen said. “It’s going to cripple a lot of government functions.”

Please tell us who these ‘radical interest groups’….

If a GOP tool has his way we will have fresh money….

No lie: South Carolina Rep. Joe Wilson has proposed the US offer a $250 cash bill bearing President Trump’s face. The long-serving congressman, who made waves in 2009 for shouting “you lie!” during a speech by then-President Obama, shared Wednesday on X what appeared to be an AI-generated image of a $250 bill with a color portrait of Trump. He claimed American families had been forced to carry more cash because “Bidenflation has destroyed the economy” and suggested a new “most valuable bill for [the] most valuable President!” per the State.

Wilson said he was “drafting legislation to direct the Bureau of Engraving and Printing to design a $250 bill featuring Donald J. Trump.” He may have forgotten that an 1866 law prevents any living person from being depicted on currency notes, per Axios. The law was a response to a living Treasury official, Spencer Clark, printing his own face on a five-cent note. Congress wanted the bill to honor William Clark of the Lewis and Clark explorations. “But allegedly, the document that reached the Treasury specified only that the new bill should honor ‘Clark,’ without clarifying which one,” per Atlas Obscura. Granted, Wilson might simply be trying to top other Republican lawmakers who’ve suggested ways to honor the president, even if it means changing the Constitution.

Trump is considering getting rid of the penny because of the cost to produce…..how much will a retool cost to print a new bill denomination?

This creep suggest changing the Constitution to make this possible but he is not a fan of doing so to help his fellow Americans.

In the first Trump cabinet meeting a line to go down in history….

President Elon Musk, during the first Cabinet meeting of his new administration, allowed also-President Donald Trump a few moments to speak Wednesday. And when Trump spoke, he uttered a phrase that will no doubt stand tall among quotes from great American leaders past.

“This country has gotten bloated and fat and disgusting,” Trump said.

Inspiring rhetoric that will surely uplift the masses off their bloated, fat and disgusting keisters. I guess.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/columnist/2025/02/26/trump-cabinet-meeting-america-fat-musk/80534668007/

Was he looking in a mirror when he made that proclamation?

Just wondering.

Golf the president real passion…..and the deals made for his business….since being in office he has spent several million dollars of taxpayer money to feed his passion.

n his first month in office, Donald Trump destroyed federal agencies, fired thousands of government workers and unleashed dozens of executive orders. The US president also found time to try to broker an agreement between two rival golf tournaments, the US-based PGA Tour and the LIV Golf league, funded by Saudi Arabia.

If concluded, the deal would directly benefit Trump’s family business, which owns and manages golf courses around the world. And it would be the latest example of Trump using the presidency to advance his personal interests.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/feb/27/trump-pga-liv-saudi-arabia

Then there is the possibility of enrichment of Elmo with a lucrative contract from the FAA….

The Federal Aviation Administration is close to canceling a massive Verizon air traffic control project and handing it to one of Elon Musk’s companies, insiders tell the Washington Post report. Verizon was awarded the $2.4 billion contract in 2023 to upgrade the country’s air traffic communication system. The move to hand the contract to Starlink, a subsidiary of Musk’s SpaceX, “would represent a significant test of protections against conflicts of interest in government projects,” the Post reports. The FAA announced Monday that it was testing Starlink satellite internet terminals at three sites, one in New Jersey and two in Alaska.

Records show that Verizon has already completed around $200 million of work on the 15-year contract, the AP reports. According to one of the Post’s sources, the government was due to make a final decision on paying Verizon next month, but Musk’s team decided Starlink should get the contract instead. The source says the lengthy process for unwinding a federal contract has not been followed in this case so far. Musk criticized Verizon in a post on X Monday, saying its system, which uses fiber optic cables, is “not working and so is putting air travelers at serious risk.” In recent days, a team of SpaceX employees has been working inside the FAA.

Ethics experts—and some former FAA officials—have questioned the lack of transparency and Musk’s conflicts of interest, the AP reports. John P. Pelissero, director of an ethics center at Santa Clara University, tells the Post it appears that “because of Musk’s current position in DOGE and his closeness to Trump, he and his company are getting an advantage and getting a contract.” “I challenge anyone to question the honesty and my technical integrity on this matter,” one of the SpaceX employees working at the FAA, Ted Malaska, said in a post on X. The AP reports that Malaska is one of three SpaceX software developers who have received “ethics waivers” from the administration that allow them to do work that could benefit Musk’s companies.

This ought bring the lawsuits and may go to SCOTUS and we know how that will end.

That was last week in Foggy Bottom…..I hope you enjoyed the round-up.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

The Fox Guarding The Hen House

Everyone by now has an opinion about the DOGE fiasco playing out in the first month of the Trump Administration…..but did know the head of the agency is a parasite on the government money?

Elmo has made billions thanx to lucrative contracts with the government….

Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, owes much of his wealth to government funding, even as he pledges to slash billions with his Department of Government Efficiency initiative.

A new Washington Post report found that the tech mogul/fascism enthusiast built his fortune from $38 billion in government contracts, loans, subsidies, and tax credits going back more than 20 years. Musk’s companies received at least $6.3 billion in commitments from state and local governments in 2024 alone, and this is likely an undercount.

The total amount of government funding that Musk has received is likely much higher, given that federal funding related to defense and intelligence projects is often classified. For example, Musk’s company SpaceX has a contract to build spy satellites from the National Reconnaissance Office, an intelligence agency tasked with building satellites for national defense. That contract is reportedly worth $1.8 billion, according to The Wall Street Journal.

According to the Post, Musk’s companies have close to a dozen other local grants, tax credits, and reimbursements whose costs are not publicly known. Musk also has 52 ongoing contracts with seven government agencies—including the Department of Defense, the General Services Administration, and NASA—that could pay his companies $11.8 billion in the next few years.

Tesla has been a major beneficiary of federal and state government funding, receiving $11.4 billion in regulatory credits meant to boost electric cars. Tesla sales have been helped by a $7,500 tax credit for buyers of electric vehicles too.

https://newrepublic.com/post/192001/elon-musk-government-funding-wealth

I would wager that none of his very lucrative contracts are on the chopping block.

How about you?

This is how you make sure your business interests are protected.

Word is the the contracts that have been terminated by DOGE may not be the cash cow they are said to be….

News accounts continue to challenge Elon Musk’s claims of major savings thanks to the Department of Government Efficiency he runs. On Monday, DOGE published an updated “wall of receipts” list of about 2,300 contracts that have been terminated across the federal government. The problem? The AP reports that nearly 800 of those cancellations won’t yield any savings whatsoever because the money already has been committed.

  • “It’s like confiscating used ammunition after it’s been shot when there’s nothing left in it. It doesn’t accomplish any policy objective,” says Charles Tiefer, an expert on government contracting law. “Their terminating so many contracts pointlessly obviously doesn’t accomplish anything for saving money.”
  • As a story at Axios explains, the only way to get truly meaningful savings would be to cut defense, Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security, which collectively make up 86% of the budget. President Trump, however, has promised not to touch any of them.
  • “When you consider where federal money really goes, most DOGE oddities and outrages amount to rounding errors in a sea of government obligations,” write Mike Allen and Jim VandeHei.
  • A defense: The AP quotes an anonymous administration official who says the canceled contracts are still important for the message they send about efficiency. And the Axios piece cites a Harris Poll survey showing that 72% of registered voters back the idea of an agency focused on the issue. “So Trump and his aides correctly calculate that both the cuts and the tales of government insanity are popular with the vast majority of Americans,” the outlet notes.

I think that this agency will be no more effective than the last Trump administration.

But that is just me.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

 

Cracking Down On Social Security Fraud

By now almost everyone knows that Elmo and his band of thugs in DOGE are taking on ‘saving’ the taxpayers money by gutting government.

Recently they were given access to people’s Social Security information, confidential information, in an attempt to head off the millions of dead getting money.

Let’s look at all that imagined fraud.

The Trump administration is falsely claiming that tens of millions of dead people over 100 years old are receiving Social Security payments, the AP reports. Over the past few days, President Trump and Elon Musk have said on social media and in press briefings that people who are 100, 200, and even 300 years old are improperly getting benefits—a “HUGE problem,” Musk wrote. It is true that improper payments have been made, including some to dead people. But the numbers thrown out by Musk and the White House are overstated and misrepresent Social Security data.

  • What has the Trump administration said about payments to centenarians? On Tuesday, Trump said that “we have millions and millions of people over 100 years old” receiving Social Security benefits. He said Social Security would be “very powerful” if those people were removed from the system.
  • So are tens of millions of people over 100 years old receiving benefits? No. Part of the confusion comes from Social Security’s software system based on the COBOL programming language, which has a lack of date type. This means that some entries with missing or incomplete birthdates will default to a reference point of more than 150 years ago. Reports from the Social Security Administration’s inspector general state that the agency has not established a new system to properly annotate death information in its database, which included roughly 18.9 million Social Security numbers of people born in 1920 or earlier but were not marked as deceased. This does not mean, however, that these individuals were receiving benefits. A 2023 report states that “almost none of the numberholders discussed in the report currently receive SSA payments.” As of 2015, the agency automatically stops payments to people who are older than 115 years old.
  • How big of a problem is Social Security fraud? A 2024 report from Social Security’s inspector general states that from fiscal 2015 through 2022, the agency paid out almost $8.6 trillion in benefits, including $71.8 billion—or less than 1%—in improper payments, mostly overpayments to living people. In early January, the US Treasury clawed back more than $31 million in federal payments—not just Social Security payments—that improperly went to dead people, a recovery that former Treasury official David Lebryk said was “just the tip of the iceberg.” The Treasury estimated that it would recover $215 million over three years.

The fraud in the Social Security system is a typical lie of the GOP….a few years ago it was the welfare system that was the target and that turned out to be ma fucking lie but yet they keep telling it year after year and yet there are some Americans that repeat this lie every chance they get

DOGE is a massive scam….

Even if you believe that Musk is trying to root out waste and fraud (and you really shouldn’t), he and his dweeby hatchet bros are only making things more corrupt and expensive.

https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/doge-results-government-waste-scam/

Even with information to contrary there are some that want to believe these thugs are doing the right thing….they are not.

But not to worry these parasites will be coming for Medicare soon.  (Post to follow)

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Whatcha Gonna Do When They Come For You?

I think I solved my ‘editor’ problem so I will try again to give an excellent post.

It started with the GOP and their relentless assault on the Affirmative Action policies….they won that battle with the help of the hacks on the Supreme Court and they continued their assault especially when the DEI program was introduced and then Donny shows up and wins and now the assault is almost complete….the total elimination of any fairness in government and society.

For many Americans, Donald Trump’s head-spinning array of executive orders in the early days of his second term look like an unprecedented effort to roll back democracy and the rights and liberties of American citizens.

But it isn’t unprecedented.

As we have written, American history is not a steady march toward greater equality, democracy and individual rights. America’s commitment to these liberal values has competed with an alternative set of illiberal values that hold that full American citizenship should be limited by race, ethnicity, gender and class.

The most famous example of this conflict is the Jim Crow era after Reconstruction, when many of the political and legal rights gained by African Americans in the Civil War era were swept away by disenfranchisement, segregation and discrimination. From roughly 1870 until 1940, democracy and equal rights were retreating, not advancing, leaving what was described in the 1960s by President Lyndon Johnson as “the crippling legacy of bigotry and injustice.”

Today, the Trump administration is seeking to roll back America’s commitment to equality and engaging in a broad effort to limit – if not outright deny – the rights, liberties and benefits of democracy to all Americans.

60 years of progress in expanding rights is being rolled back by Trump – a pattern that’s all too familiar in US history

They have sidelined the brown population then they went after any trans people and now it looks like the next target for Elmo and Donny will be our handicapped citizens.

President Trump’s suggestion last month that the tragic Potomac air crash was somehow the fault of disabled federal air traffic controllers was appalling—but it should have come as no surprise. Trump’s contempt for people with disabilities has been well documented, and it’s that animus, combined with the accelerating MAGA assault on diversity throughout the United States, that has disability rights advocates preparing to defend decades worth of hard-won protections.

One month into his presidency, Trump has unleashed a government-wide attack on people with disabilities, from anti-diversity executive orders to proposed special-education rollbacks to threats to slash programs like Medicaid that are lifelines for disabled people across the country. If successful, these actions could have catastrophic consequences for millions of Americans, according to disability rights experts.

“This is a crisis for the disability community, and the threat is extremely serious,” Maria Town, president and CEO of the American Association of People with Disabilities, told The Nation. “These changes have the potential to erode decades of progress that the disability community has fought tooth and nail to achieve.”

https://www.thenation.com/article/society/trump-dei-target-access-disabilities/

Who’s next on the GOP/Trump hit list?

I think our disabled vets need to be paying attention to what these thugs are doing to our society….a society that use to pride itself on fairness for all and now the government is tearing down decades of progress….and the truly sad part is that the American voter in its hatred for others has made all this discrimination possible.

Is this the true face of America?

I ask….where will you be when they come for you?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”