2 minutes ago, The Norseman said:

I don't want the conversation to go anywhere. By most measures it has not been as successful as planned, I get it. But, it is ongoing, and I think the activity of rooting out and cancelling needless government spending is value added activity that should continue in perpetuity.

I think you are vastly overestimating what is happening now. The DOGE mission is also in the process of moving over to review of regulations and the chasing of cost savings is winding down formally.

DOGE found out what every other similarly minded effort has: there isn't nearly as much wasteful spending as is promised on the campaign trail or in echo chambers.

That's not to say there isn't wasteful spending. But the effort to root out that spending does at some point cost more than the savings it would yield.

The only way to meaningfully cut spending is through reforms only possible by Congressional acts.

33 minutes ago, JohnSnowsHair said:

DOGE found out what every other similarly minded effort has: there isn't nearly as much wasteful spending as is promised on the campaign trail or in echo chambers.

That's not to say there isn't wasteful spending. But the effort to root out that spending does at some point cost more than the savings it would yield.

The only way to meaningfully cut spending is through reforms only possible by Congressional acts.

That’s right. DOGE has largely been a purely performative event.

4 hours ago, DrPhilly said:

That’s right. DOGE has largely been a purely performative event.

Yes and no. DOGE still carries a lot of power in government agencies (Purchase and contract award approval, travel as well).

when does DOGE really dig into congress?

also, maybe they could help out with the holdups on trump releasing all of the epstein files? surely DOGE could find a more efficient way to get all of that sorted out and made public.

Still chippin away!

4 minutes ago, The Norseman said:

Still chippin away!

Dude, give it up. They said they would save 2T and all audits of their work puts it at about 50B. A massive marketing campaign and not much savings from a relative perspective. Instead, the BBB will add on 5T+ to the deficit. What a load of BS.

44 minutes ago, The Norseman said:

Still chippin away!

The BBB pretty much destroys this effort. Played yourself again.

Still chipping away!

2 hours ago, DrPhilly said:

Dude, give it up. They said they would save 2T and all audits of their work puts it at about 50B. A massive marketing campaign and not much savings from a relative perspective. Instead, the BBB will add on 5T+ to the deficit. What a load of BS.

And you said they were dead and would dissolve

9 minutes ago, The Norseman said:

And you said they were dead and would dissolve

Yes I did and I was right.

39 minutes ago, The Norseman said:

And you said they were dead and would dissolve

What I said was that the work would grind to a pittance (I never said that the entity DOGE would be dissolved) and the key Musk whiz kids would be gone by the fall. Big Ballz resigned end of June. I don't know about the others but no way they stick around DOGE for long. In addition, clearly all the momentum of DOGE is gone.

DOGE was a big success in terms of the shock and awe effect Trump was looking for early on. All that is dead and buried and with very minor actual numerical results to show for all the hype.

47 minutes ago, The Norseman said:

And you said they were dead and would dissolve

Oh yeah, they are really alive and kickin' alright. Look at those results! Undeniable.

4 hours ago, Paul852 said:

Oh yeah, they are really alive and kickin' alright. Look at those results! Undeniable.

They saved $2 trillion!!!!

14 hours ago, DrPhilly said:

What I said was that the work would grind to a pittance (I never said that the entity DOGE would be dissolved) and the key Musk whiz kids would be gone by the fall. Big Ballz resigned end of June. I don't know about the others but no way they stick around DOGE for long. In addition, clearly all the momentum of DOGE is gone.

DOGE was a big success in terms of the shock and awe effect Trump was looking for early on. All that is dead and buried and with very minor actual numerical results to show for all the hype.

But it hasn't ground to a pittance. The structure they set up in the agencies continues and their efforts are being recorded on the Doge website daily. Contracts are being cancelled, fraud and inefficiencies are being identified and rooted out. The pace of savings looks to be about the same as it was before.

Clearly they didn't hit their 2T target, but the initiative is alive and well.

5 minutes ago, The Norseman said:

But it hasn't ground to a pittance. The structure they set up in the agencies continues and their efforts are being recorded on the Doge website daily. Contracts are being cancelled, fraud and inefficiencies are being identified and rooted out. The pace of savings looks to be about the same as it was before.

Clearly they didn't hit their 2T target, but the initiative is alive and well.

Of course it has gone down to a normal level (pittance) of review. Do you think contracts were never reviewed/cancelled before DOGE? The speed and scope of the first few months is totally gone.

24 minutes ago, DrPhilly said:

Of course it has gone down to a normal level (pittance) of review. Do you think contracts were never reviewed/cancelled before DOGE? The speed and scope of the first few months is totally gone.

Just because you keep saying a thing doesn't make it true. They've tacked on $10B since Musk left and each agency continues to post savings against their targets daily. Maybe it has slowed a little, but not by much. I'm sure contracts were cancelled in the past, but not nearly at the pace that they set up new ones.

The initiative that was set up and institutionalized continues.

They took an existing agency that was already doing these things, slapped a meme name on it, paraded early cuts around like a win, savings revert to the norm and Elon bolts before the impacts of the early cuts are understood.

#winning.

15 minutes ago, The Norseman said:

Just because you keep saying a thing doesn't make it true. They've tacked on $10B since Musk left and each agency continues to post savings against their targets daily. Maybe it has slowed a little, but not by much. I'm sure contracts were cancelled in the past, but not nearly at the pace that they set up new ones.

The initiative that was set up and institutionalized continues.

Again, the special part about DOGE was the speed and scale. There has always been a group working on cutting govt contracts and costs. There is absolutely nothing new at all about that.

Overall, a left over advertised savings of 10B (more likely 2.5B if they continue with their 25% of real vs. advertised savings) after the initial shock&awe drive isn't representative of any furthered or continued advanced momentum. The more important topic is the overall picture where Trump adds trillions to the deficit while "saving" 10s of Billion. How you can't understand this is beyond me.

4 hours ago, DrPhilly said:

Again, the special part about DOGE was the speed and scale. There has always been a group working on cutting govt contracts and costs. There is absolutely nothing new at all about that.

Overall, a left over advertised savings of 10B (more likely 2.5B if they continue with their 25% of real vs. advertised savings) after the initial shock&awe drive isn't representative of any furthered or continued advanced momentum. The more important topic is the overall picture where Trump adds trillions to the deficit while "saving" 10s of Billion. How you can't understand this is beyond me.

Cementing the current tax rates and not letting them expire is not "new spending", despite what the CBO has led you to believe. And no, Doge set up a structure within each agency to cut waste and to publicly track their progress which was not in place before. That process will continue and I will regularly remind you of their ongoing efforts.

56 minutes ago, The Norseman said:

Cementing the current tax rates and not letting them expire is not "new spending", despite what the CBO has led you to believe. And no, Doge set up a structure within each agency to cut waste and to publicly track their progress which was not in place before. That process will continue and I will regularly remind you of their ongoing efforts.

Where did I say anything about "new spending"? What I said was that the deficit would be increasing and that is not what Trump campaigned on and totally runs counter to any concept of DOGE savings having any real impact.

You say you're an expert at managing company processes to align financial solvency so you surely understand the concept of adding to the debt by an amount that is 20x greater than the amount you say you are saving.

24 minutes ago, DrPhilly said:

Where did I say anything about "new spending"? What I said was that the deficit would be increasing and that is not what Trump campaigned on and totally runs counter to any concept of DOGE savings having any real impact.

You say you're an expert at managing company processes to align financial solvency so you surely understand the concept of adding to the debt by an amount that is 20x greater than the amount you say you are saving.

The CBO erroneously calls it "spending" because the tax cuts were set to expire. He campaigned on keeping the tax rates static, which he did. The fact that that deficit continues to increase has far more to do with our overruns on entitlements and current interest rates than it does our current tax structure.

1 hour ago, The Norseman said:

Cementing the current tax rates and not letting them expire is not "new spending", despite what the CBO has led you to believe. And no, Doge set up a structure within each agency to cut waste and to publicly track their progress which was not in place before. That process will continue and I will regularly remind you of their ongoing efforts.

Making more permanent the tax cuts that were set to expire adds to the deficit and debt. Whether you call it spending or whatever, it means more debt. That debt represents a cost to the nation and the future.

1 hour ago, JohnSnowsHair said:

Making more permanent the tax cuts that were set to expire adds to the deficit and debt. Whether you call it spending or whatever, it means more debt. That debt represents a cost to the nation and the future.

Keeping the tax baseline the same isn't an addition, the debt increases due to our unwillingness to cut spending.