this post was submitted on 23 Mar 2025
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[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 day ago

The stupid "doge" thing was never about balancing the budget anyway. That's all bullshit red meat for the dumbasses that voted for donvict.

[–] [email protected] 40 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (3 children)

Let’s qualify this more accurately. It’s not lost. It’s “lost.”

Let’s all keep an eye out for the shiny new upgrades to putin’s war crimes in Ukraine.

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[–] [email protected] 39 points 2 days ago (3 children)

Wait till you see how much we loose from killing the Department of Education. Education is like the easiest ROI

[–] [email protected] 17 points 2 days ago

Just like in corporate america, the savings hit this quarter so bonuses all around. Then the CEO jumps ship and it's someone else's problem next quarter.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 day ago (2 children)

It's not the quickest though. ROI timeline is 18 years minimum for tax from non-degree level jobs, 22/23 years for degree level, and 26 to 30 years for post doctoral.

It's sad. The quarterly pressure to generate value is one of the worst economic forces of capitalism which drives enshitification, job-instability from the "fire bottom performing 10%" so that you can post more "profits" from cost cutting, and the general short-term thinking that pervades all aspects of the culture.

It's the reason "nobody" builds things to last or metaphorically plants something now for the future: it's not profitable quick enough.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 day ago

That's what is so sad to see - whole lotta young dumbasses with the same kind of short-term thinking dunking on "boomers" and things like Social Security. As well as unions, the post office, and public schools. Even worse when the framing of it is accompanied with some blather about "my generation" and so on, yadda yadda.

They are probably so filled with Dunning-Kruger that it hasn't even occurred to them that prior "generations" were told the exact same hokum and that their "generation" is not magically any different....

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Totally agree. Was talking to my brother who worked for the US Corps of Engineers. He said they have a decades long outlook for their projects. So if they want to remove a dam or something, studies are done to make sure that is the smartest move not just for the next few years, but the next several decades.

So refreshing vs the typical "new CEO wants to fire x% of the workforce to generate 1% more profit this year (ignore the fact that customers will leave when it's that much shittier here... That's next year's (and next Ceo's) problem)".

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)
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[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 day ago

I think we should organize and go demand everyone working for DOGE... stop. And not demand like with funny signs and chants, but like with 2nd amendment arms.

[–] [email protected] 288 points 2 days ago (8 children)

Lost.

Not saved. Lost. Elon and the Musketeers lost this nation half a trillion dollars.

[–] [email protected] 90 points 2 days ago
[–] [email protected] 17 points 2 days ago (2 children)

You're spinning it wrong. "With the doge cuts, we saved you half a trillion dollars in taxes"

[–] [email protected] 18 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

…that’s not what happened.

This is like a fuck off huge gas turbine generator spinning at full chat and then just starting to take parts off of it and snipping fluid lines. One of the features of turbines is that they will continue to run for a bit even when they’re heading in the direction of catastrophic failure, since it’s all angular momentum and no reciprocation. But it IS going to catastrophically fail.

This is the system just eating itself and money being - at best - siphoned into someone’s pockets, or more likely, just being outright wasted. The USAID cuts, for instance, basically locked an absolute shitload of consumables and perishables in warehouses to spoil. That’s what we’re talking about. And that’s only the most obvious example.

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 2 days ago

And don't forget the 10 trillion in lost war plane sales due to "toning them down in case our allies turn on us', just like he has turned on Canada and Europe.

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[–] [email protected] 228 points 2 days ago (5 children)

It should be blatantly obvious to anyone paying attention that the "Department of Government Efficiency" isn't really about efficiency.

[–] [email protected] 129 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Just like the "ministry of truth" isn't about the truth.

[–] [email protected] 37 points 2 days ago (1 children)

And now the "environmental protection agency" is about extracting profit at the expense of the environment

[–] [email protected] 22 points 2 days ago

Environmental Plundering Agency

[–] [email protected] 40 points 2 days ago (4 children)

Remember, they're talking about efficiency all day long, but they're not mentioning effectivity with a single word.

Efficiency is how fast/cheap/ressource-less you can get something done. Effectivity is if you're even doing the right thing at all.

You can be super efficient, but still not be effective by doing something, so....

[–] [email protected] 17 points 2 days ago

I mean we can just say they aren't about efficiency because they don't research anything before they start making cuts it's simply I don't like USAID let's gut it, I don't like the SSA so let's gut it.

They know what they're doing even if Trump somehow gets the boot we're looking at probably 50 years or more to get back our world position if they don't fuck our economy up so badly it's effectively impossible to comeback.

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[–] [email protected] 50 points 2 days ago (1 children)

To their credit they're destroying government to pave the way for oligarchy very efficiently

[–] [email protected] 83 points 2 days ago (1 children)

They are already an oligarchy, they are paving the way for an authoritarian dictatorship now.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 2 days ago (3 children)

Does it seem stupid only to me to destroy the environment they thrived in?

[–] [email protected] 30 points 2 days ago

They are not smart. They are just pathologically greedy people born to wealth.

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[–] [email protected] 49 points 2 days ago (2 children)

You gotta give it to Elmo, few people would have been able to pull off that feat. I mean, losing that much money takes hard work and dedication, and I'm not even kidding hete. It actually takes a certain skill set (extreme incompetency combined with an unending unearned confidence) to be able to lose that much money that quickly. I was impressed with the money he lost from Twitter, but that's peanuts now, that's a rounding error in comparison to what he's losing the US now.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 2 days ago

That money isn't lost, I think we all know who's going to divvy it up when all is said and done.

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[–] [email protected] 200 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (1 children)

MAGA/DOGE were bragging about getting like 100 billion dollars over ten years from tariffs while the US gains ~1.5 trillion dollars every year in income tax revenue.

Everything is bad right now.

[–] [email protected] 83 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Not for the rich, but that was the plan all along

[–] [email protected] 40 points 2 days ago (1 children)

It will be. Their short sightedness will lead to their ruin in a dictatorship. History has shown this time and time again. But these billionaire aren't known for being smart or history buffs.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 2 days ago

Yeah I hope musk realizes that he's just today's https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermann_G%C3%B6ring

[–] [email protected] 45 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago)

Imagine being so fucking dumb you use IRS data to go after immigrants who are paying taxes, thus ensuring no immigrant ever pays taxes again.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 day ago

Oh so sad. Elect a clown expect a circus.

Install an unelected billionaire, expect theft.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Anyone checked behind the couch cushions?

[–] [email protected] 38 points 2 days ago (6 children)
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[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I think DOGE should send out stimulas checks because of all the money that is going to be saved.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 day ago (1 children)

This would be more than reasonable if they were actually doing what they said.

In real life, they're costing the US an insane amount of money, and working class taxpayers will carry the burden of paying for it as usual.

It could easily set a new record for largest transfer of wealth from the workers to the rich in human history.

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[–] [email protected] 18 points 2 days ago

Making big losses attracts investors. - Elon Musk

[–] [email protected] 109 points 2 days ago (2 children)

From what I hear.....elon, thief and their cronies are specifically wrecking government to push a corporate takeover...jeeze. it's like robocop.

[–] [email protected] 58 points 2 days ago (4 children)

And/or destabilizing the country's economy and political power worldwide so our enemies like Russia can do whatever they want without the US interfering. The complete destruction of US soft power via things like USAID and the blatant attempts to destroy any collaboration with our allies seems to point more in that direction.

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[–] [email protected] 49 points 2 days ago (4 children)

Worse than RoboCop, we don't have a cool robot cop shooting dicks off to show for it

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[–] [email protected] 26 points 2 days ago

Look at THAT Efficiency!

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 days ago

I guess we will lives like Russian and drink cheap American alcohol to forget it all happened.

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