Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez unleashes

[Dr Exiled]

That's something the Wall Street Democrats that worship their billionaires perhaps need to take a hard look at. They need to go back to their former base. Schumer's plans to go after the wealthier segment hasn't worked.

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/c ... n-suburbs/

The suggested strategy of ‘Make the Democrats fix the unconstitutional dismantling of government agencies by random billionaires doing so via Trump’s explicit permission and under complete Republican acquiescence’ seems somewhat resigned on your part.

Any other ideas?

Perhaps we don't need to be meddling around the world through USAID? I'm tired of the wars and constant interference we do. DOGE is doing what Trump set out to do, get rid of the so-called deep state. Now, instead of bitching about it, the Democrats should take up the torch and demand that DOGE look at the DOD and the more than $1 Trillion in annual spending done there. I'm sure there is a whole bunch of waste in that cesspool. They should also demand that someone independent take Musk's place as he is a big defense contractor. His contracts should be scrutinized along with the others. How about then audit all these agencies? The DOD continually fails audits and isn't ever taken to task. Congress spinelessly refused to audit the money going to Ukraine (probably just funneled back to our beloved defense contractors and others). Then there are the black budgets, etc.

In any event, Congress still appropriates the money. We will survive. The sky isn't falling.

Here is something interesting:

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/pol ... government

The government is giving money to politico, NY Times and others. Perhaps the Democrats need to now uncover the largess going to Republican organs? The theft is probably occurring with both parties and the money is probably ending up with our billionaire class. Let's take a look.

[Dr Exiled]

Here is another article about how certain markets are reacting to DOGE:

https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/goldm ... nse-stocks

Maybe Wall Street realizes the era of drunk controllers and high accountants at these companies that depend on the government teat is at an end too?

[canpakes]

Now, instead of bitching about it, the Democrats should take up the torch and demand that DOGE look at the DOD and the more than $1 Trillion in annual spending done there.

A billionaire financed a quarter of Trump’s re-election campaign and received his own government agency in return, under the claim that it will supposedly ‘cut government waste’ … but it’ll be on the Democrats to remind and prod for that agency to look at the DOD?

I'm sure there is a whole bunch of waste in that cesspool.

Right. But, there’s also a much larger pool of lobbyists and CEO’s with interests in maintaining the current state of things within the DOD than exist for that same function for USAID, so it figures that the DOD didn’t make the top
Of the list.

They should also demand that someone independent take Musk's place as he is a big defense contractor. His contracts should be scrutinized along with the others.

Ya think? : D

From: https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/p ... 235257829/

“X, formerly Twitter, currently faces a lawsuit from the Securities and Exchange Commission that alleges he withheld information about the stake he was acquiring in the company ahead of his bid to purchase it. The Department of Labor, which could be next on the chopping block for DOGE, has probed and fined Tesla and SpaceX for unsafe working conditions through the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Tesla is also under investigation by the Justice Department for possible securities and wire fraud related to its unsupported claims about fully autonomous vehicles.

SpaceX has additionally been fined by the Environmental Protection Agency and the Federal Aviation Administration — and Musk personally pressured the last FAA administrator to resign, leaving the agency leaderless when a commercial passenger jet and U.S. Army helicopter collided in mid-air over the Potomac River in D.C. last week, killing 67 people. (Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said on Wednesday that DOGE staff were going to “plug in to help upgrade our aviation system.” Duffy’s department includes the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which has its own ongoing investigation into Tesla’s self-driving features.) The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is suing Tesla over alleged racial harassment at a manufacturing plant, and the National Labor Relations Board has tangled with both Tesla and SpaceX, with the result that Musk’s companies and other corporate behemoths are waging a legal battle to see the agency declared unconstitutional and wiped off the map for good.

Musk has given no indication that he might stop short of meddling in any one of these regulatory bodies, whether by firing workers, appointing new leadership, or redirecting funds from the Treasury Department, where DOGE is already deeply embedded. “Regulations, basically, should be default gone,” he said in a recent late-night call on X Spaces. On Wednesday, he touted the work he claimed DOGE would be doing at the FAA, an agency he has long criticized for its enforcement actions against SpaceX — brazenly diving into an area where he has a well-known conflict of interest. Meanwhile, it seems unlikely that a government in which Musk wields this kind of power will pull SpaceX’s lucrative contracts with NASA and the Defense Department.

Multiple unions have sued the Treasury, the Labor Department, and DOGE itself in an attempt to thwart the commission’s access to sensitive data and highly secured systems in these institutions, and federal officials have argued that Musk’s aggressive incursions violate federal law.”

The theft is probably occurring with both parties and the money is probably ending up with our billionaire class. Let's take a look.

Maybe start with the billionaire who was gifted his own all-powerful government agency after paying for one-quarter of the President’s billion-dollar re-election campaign?

Whaddya think?

[Gunnar]

Now, instead of bitching about it, the Democrats should take up the torch and demand that DOGE look at the DOD and the more than $1 Trillion in annual spending done there.

A billionaire financed a quarter of Trump’s re-election campaign and received his own government agency in return, under the claim that it will supposedly ‘cut government waste’ ... but it’ll be on the Democrats to remind and prod for that agency to look at the DOD?

I'm sure there is a whole bunch of waste in that cesspool.

Right. But, there’s also a much larger pool of lobbyists and CEO’s with interests in maintaining the current state of things within the DOD than exist for that same function for USAID, so it figures that the DOD didn’t make the top
Of the list.

They should also demand that someone independent take Musk's place as he is a big defense contractor. His contracts should be scrutinized along with the others.

Ya think? : D

From: https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/p ... 235257829/

“X, formerly Twitter, currently faces a lawsuit from the Securities and Exchange Commission that alleges he withheld information about the stake he was acquiring in the company ahead of his bid to purchase it. The Department of Labor, which could be next on the chopping block for DOGE, has probed and fined Tesla and SpaceX for unsafe working conditions through the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Tesla is also under investigation by the Justice Department for possible securities and wire fraud related to its unsupported claims about fully autonomous vehicles.

SpaceX has additionally been fined by the Environmental Protection Agency and the Federal Aviation Administration — and Musk personally pressured the last FAA administrator to resign, leaving the agency leaderless when a commercial passenger jet and U.S. Army helicopter collided in mid-air over the Potomac River in D.C. last week, killing 67 people. (Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said on Wednesday that DOGE staff were going to “plug in to help upgrade our aviation system.” Duffy’s department includes the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which has its own ongoing investigation into Tesla’s self-driving features.) The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is suing Tesla over alleged racial harassment at a manufacturing plant, and the National Labor Relations Board has tangled with both Tesla and SpaceX, with the result that Musk’s companies and other corporate behemoths are waging a legal battle to see the agency declared unconstitutional and wiped off the map for good.

Musk has given no indication that he might stop short of meddling in any one of these regulatory bodies, whether by firing workers, appointing new leadership, or redirecting funds from the Treasury Department, where DOGE is already deeply embedded. “Regulations, basically, should be default gone,” he said in a recent late-night call on X Spaces. On Wednesday, he touted the work he claimed DOGE would be doing at the FAA, an agency he has long criticized for its enforcement actions against SpaceX — brazenly diving into an area where he has a well-known conflict of interest. Meanwhile, it seems unlikely that a government in which Musk wields this kind of power will pull SpaceX’s lucrative contracts with NASA and the Defense Department.

Multiple unions have sued the Treasury, the Labor Department, and DOGE itself in an attempt to thwart the commission’s access to sensitive data and highly secured systems in these institutions, and federal officials have argued that Musk’s aggressive incursions violate federal law.”

The theft is probably occurring with both parties and the money is probably ending up with our billionaire class. Let's take a look.

Maybe start with the billionaire who was gifted his own all-powerful government agency after paying for one-quarter of the President’s billion-dollar re-election campaign?

Whaddya think?

I can't imagine a more scandalous and more obviously corrupt and unlawful conflict of interest than that! If a Democrat President gave some wealthy oligarch donor the power to oversee and force the resignation of the director of the very agency tasked to justly investigate him and his company for unlawful violation of safety regulations and other illegalities, the Republicans would not rest until both that President and said oligarch were justly removed from office and even jailed! Yet, they hardly bat an eyelash when their own President and his oligarch donor friend are guilty of that very thing! Can anyone else imagine a greater or more blatantly corrupt and scandalous hypocrisy than that?

[Jersey Girl]

Can anyone else imagine a greater or more blatantly corrupt and scandalous hypocrisy than that?

Not really. Give Trump and Co-President Musk a few more hours and they'll dream it right up then show us the result.

[Dwight]

To add to the list, USAID's inspector general was looking into Starlink's contracts in Ukraine.

https://gizmodo.com/elon-musks-enemy-us ... 2000559365

[Dr Exiled]

I know you guys don't like someone probing your team's spending and would much rather probe the other team. Why be on a team if not to support it? However, shouldn't we welcome the idea that spending is being audited? Shouldn't we welcome cleaning up fraud and waste? There's probably a lot of republican waste, fraud and abuse for the democrats to crow about when found. So, let's have at it. Get the democrat version of DOGE going. Musk opened up a can of worms and now let's look at all of it, including his government contracts.

[Doctor Steuss]

On the topic of DOGE, I stumbled upon this yesterday. I've never heard of this website, but the major media bias outlets have it ranked as "center," and "reliable." That said, I'm not finding any other reports on this, and can't find a secondary source for the appropriation quote.

If this is true, Musk's little team of a handful of 20-something techbros have requested $7 million to cover their expenses for their first weeks. A million dollars per person every few weeks sounds super efficient, and not corrupt at all.

But what was once thought of as an outside advisory board is now very much inside the federal government and drawing an official salary, so to speak. Nearly $7 million has been “apportioned” over the past week to cover the agency’s expenses, while the administration tries to freeze big chunks of government funding as part of DOGE’s mandate to root out programs deemed wasteful or out of step with the president’s priorities.

Link

There are some leaps made in this reporting, which I'm hesitant to accept, despite the ranking of "reliable" by the key media bias outlets, but if even partially true, DOGE is turning out to be one of the more hilarious grifts that Trump has pulled.

[Molok]

shouldn't we welcome the idea that spending is being audited? Shouldn't we welcome cleaning up fraud and waste?

oh, is that what's happening?

[Jersey Girl]

To add to the list, USAID's inspector general was looking into Starlink's contracts in Ukraine.

https://gizmodo.com/elon-musks-enemy-us ... 2000559365

Yeah see? And I think there's multiple contracts involved, not just starlink/Ukraine. This guy is up to no good. Trying to make it impossible not to greenlight his ventures.

Listen, I don't know a lot about any of this stuff but Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said there's a deadline coming up. I don't think anyone on the thread actually addressed it but let me take a shot at putting some of the pieces together. If I'm wrong then I'm wrong.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said the tax breaks to billionaires are about to expire. So what if...Trump and Co-President Musk are trying to come in the back door to increase their wealth without overtly issuing more tax breaks?

Does that make sense to anyone with a brain? I'd like to read opinions on that.