Comment by karel-3d
2 days ago
Honestly when DOGE was first announced, I thought it will be a tiny department that does almost nothing and produces recommendations and PDFs that nobody reads. I didn't expect this.
2 days ago
Honestly when DOGE was first announced, I thought it will be a tiny department that does almost nothing and produces recommendations and PDFs that nobody reads. I didn't expect this.
My brain immediately latched on to how much control could be exerted through the guise of "efficiency", you could effetely run a whole government from there. But I was expecting more installing a bunch of so-called "efficiency officers" in every department to report back when they weren't being loyal... er efficient.
I was not expecting the complete takeover of computer networks and rapid firing of large numbers of employees.
Musk has basically discovered that you can ignore existing laws, since by the time lawyers sue and courts order injunctions, it'll be too late and too expensive. Especially when lawyers can argue against basic facts like "Musk doesn't head DOGE". It's the same playbook as the twitter layoffs - when you are so rich, you don't need to care about laws.
Move fast, break things.
Easier to ask for forgiveness than for permission.
YOLO.
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There were signs but people thought it implausibly stupid:
> Vice-president JD Vance has cited Yarvin as an influence, saying in 2021, "So there's this guy Curtis Yarvin who has written about these things," which included "Retire All Government Employees," or RAGE, written in 2012. Vance said that if Trump became president again, "I think what Trump should do, if I was giving him one piece of advice: Fire every single midlevel bureaucrat, every civil servant in the administrative state, and replace them with our people. And when the courts stop you, stand before the country and say, 'The chief justice has made his ruling. Now let him enforce it.'"[17][52]
hm, maybe it's better if Trump stays president for 4 years (instead of Vance coming up). The devil you know...
Vance is just a figurehead for Theil, Musk, Sacks etc.
It's obvious from recent video of Musk and Trump that Trump is also a figurehead at this point.
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Vance doesn’t have Trump’s sway with the ‘base’, or mob. Vance can have all the dictatorial aspirations in the world, but he doesn’t have the popular support or influence, like Trump does, to act on them.
Read the Bufferfly Revolution by Curtis Yarvin (April, 2022)
> We’ve got to risk a full power start—a full reboot of the USG. We can only do this by giving absolute sovereignty to a single organization—with roughly the powers that the Allied occupation authorities held in Japan and Germany in the fall of 1945.
> Trump himself will not be the brain of this butterfly. He will not be the CEO. He will be the chairman of the board—he will select the CEO (an experienced executive). This process, which obviously has to be televised, will be complete by his inauguration—at which the transition to the next regime will start immediately.
https://graymirror.substack.com/p/the-butterfly-revolution
For context, this is Moldbug, the leading voice in the "Dark Enlightenment" movement. Basically he convinced the tech bros this was a good idea
That was the Vivek plan. He got sidelined.
Why?
Nobody expects the DOGEish inquistion! Yeah I kinda thought that too.
Musk isn't a do-things-by-half kind of guy.
But also when you make cuts, you go hard, fast, and recover from there. Any effort of small trimming over a long period achieves no saving while producing the same negative publicity. I doubt such cutting effort will happen for another 30y.
There is a french say I like. If you need to cut a dog’s tail, don’t cut an inch every day, chop the whole thing quick
This isn't just cuts though, this is dismantling checks and balances, international relationships, and many people will die from this.
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> There is a french say I like. If you need to cut a dog’s tail, don’t cut an inch every day, chop the whole thing quick
Well there’s cutting off the dogs tail, and then there’s accidentally cutting off your own fingers in your haste to get the dogs tail.
There is another saying:
Slow is smooth and smooth is fast.
Act quickly when needed but not so quickly that you don’t have time to assess. You should know what you’re cutting before you cut.
In the French saying is cutting the tail off a dog seen as a cruel and unnecessary action, that you shouldn't prolong any longer than necessary, or a valid task that needs done?
I see the legal status of tail docking is slightly laxer in France but in North America the US and Canadian Vetinary Associations disavow the practice as bad for the dog.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Docking_(dog)
The French, famous for their budget cuts and government efficiency.
Same thing for butchery. Cut the carcass and sell the parts.
Or is this slicing the dog in half?