In reality, the American government isn't lean. It's incredibly heavy. It's just that all of the weight is dedicated to intervening on behalf of the capitalist class and not the working class. If "small government" politicians weren't disgusting liars, the first things they would gut would be the military and intelligence budgets, followed by police budgets.

ya the fact that every major outlet was parroting some version of "Doge has been established to cut 'wasteful spending'", taking the whole thing at face value.