Opinion
Jamelle Bouie
There Is No Going Back
Feb. 5, 2025
Even if anyone had elected Elon Musk to anything, the past week would still be one of the most serious examples of executive branch malfeasance in American history.
Musk has seized hold of critical levers of power and authority within the federal government, apparently enabling him to destroy federal agencies at will, barring congressional action or judicial pushback.
Musk’s team, which includes a small gaggle of young aides, reportedly ages 19 to 24 — have taken control of the Office of Personnel Management and the General Services Administration. They also have access to the Treasury Department’s payment system, which provides a direct line to sensitive information about tens of millions of Americans, including Social Security numbers and bank accounts. By his own account, Musk could use his access to the payments system — which disburses congressional appropriations to the many payees of the government — to effect a kind of personal line-item veto. If he does not believe that a program or grant is effective — if he thinks that it constitutes “waste, fraud and abuse” — then he will cancel its funding and leave it to starve on the vine.
The first casualty that we know of is the United States Agency for International Development, or U.S.A.I.D. Musk seems to hold a vendetta against the agency. He has called it a “radical-left political psy op,” a “criminal organization” and a “a viper’s nest of radical-left Marxists who hate America.” On Monday, shortly before 2 a.m., he bragged that he and his allies had spent the weekend “feeding USAID into the wood chipper.” In addition to wreaking vengeance on an agency he hates for still undisclosed reasons (although it may be worth noting that U.S.A.I.D. supported the efforts of Black South Africans during and after apartheid), Musk believes that cutting government spending is the only way to reduce inflation and put the U.S. economy on firm footing.
“When you see prices go up at the grocery store, the prices are going up because of excess government spending,” he said in an online conversation with, among others, Vivek Ramaswamy and Senator Joni Ernst of Iowa. “It’s very important to connect these dots. The supermarkets are not taking advantage of you. It’s not price gouging; it’s that the government spent too much.” (This, it must be said, makes no sense.)
Again, if Musk had been elected to some office, this would still be one of the worst abuses of executive power in American history. No one in the executive branch has the legal authority to unilaterally cancel congressional appropriations. No one has the legal authority to turn the Treasury payments system into a means of political retribution. No one has the authority to summarily dismiss civil servants without cause. No one has the authority to take down and scrub government websites of public data, itself paid for by American taxpayers. And no private citizen has the authority to access the sensitive data of American citizens for either information gathering or their own, unknown purposes.
The thing, of course, is that Musk isn’t elected. He is a private citizen. He was neither confirmed for a cabinet job nor formally appointed to a high-level position within the administration. He does not even have a presidential commission; he has been designated a “special government employee.” Musk says that he is acting on the authority of the president of the United States. Even still, it is not as if the president of the United States has the authority to unleash an unvetted, unaccountable private citizen onto some of the most sensitive data possessed by the federal government.
EXACTLY.
NOBODY ELECTED HIM.
Rest of the column at the link above.
Longtime Black Man Here (@groove_sdc) posted at 10:05 PM on Wed, Feb 05, 2025:
I’m sorry but if you called Biden “Genocide Joe” or Kamala “Holocaust Harris” you gone get this work. Forever.
Sorry if you’re in your feels about it.
Your hatred is reciprocated.
I got that exact same energy towards you and yours.
(https://x.com/groove_sdc/status/1887351822450352152?t=DLzciKnTjnDsWvP8ClM9IQ&s=03)
Robert Reich (@RBReich) posted at 2:01 PM on Thu, Feb 06, 2025:
Whole Foods, which is owned by notorious union-buster Amazon, is arguing that Trump’s dismantling of the NLRB means the company doesn’t have to recognize a newly unionized store in Philadelphia.
Looks like Jeff Bezos’s investment in Trump is paying off.
(https://x.com/RBReich/status/1887592381601530303?t=bYe3jCZE3W04fqtspGe7Qg&s=03)
Democracy Docket (@DemocracyDocket) posted at 2:01 PM on Thu, Feb 06, 2025:
The RNC asked the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn a Pennsylvania Supreme Court decision allowing voters to cast provisional ballots on Election Day if their mail-in ballots were rejected.
https://t.co/qQFgUpRUmc
(https://x.com/DemocracyDocket/status/1887592477567139906?t=l_hVFQieSg9jXQVdo7qTUA&s=03)
julie k. brown (@jkbjournalist) posted at 11:57 AM on Thu, Feb 06, 2025:
Breaking from Wapo: “The DOGE team is using AI software accessed through Microsoft’s cloud computing service Azure to pore through every dollar of money the department [of education] disburses, from contracts to grants to work trip expenses, one of the people said. Lower level
(https://x.com/jkbjournalist/status/1887561363171443147?t=kEeM9uCL94GqBJNZw1jxsQ&s=03)
The Associated Press (@AP) posted at 2:36 AM on Fri, Feb 07, 2025:
BREAKING: Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said negotiations with America “are not intelligent, wise or honorable” after President Donald Trump floated nuclear talks with Tehran. https://t.co/PWJBMTdGHV
(https://x.com/AP/status/1887782568570794203?t=q9vPXAjNu-65lP9SvUtR9g&s=03)
T. Fisher King (@T_FisherKing) posted at 6:28 PM on Thu, Feb 06, 2025:
1000s of Africans will die, and not a single “Free Palestine” Leftist will protest or attack Rubio or Trump admin as “colonising war criminals”
Cause it was never about Palestine
It was always about justifying their hate for Black dems and Jews
Always
(https://x.com/T_FisherKing/status/1887659723920396692?t=a5N1SWcZG6fWYxBcEVq4xA&s=03)
David Gilbert (@daithaigilbert) posted at 3:42 PM on Thu, Feb 06, 2025:
Elon Musk has slashed USAID workforce from 10,000 to 300 in the space of days…
The decimation leaves just 12 people in the agency’s Africa bureau, @Knibbs reports
https://t.co/4Qi7UqVzAk
(https://x.com/daithaigilbert/status/1887617942063296819?t=beaQVPps5GG7zrdeWD51wA&s=03)
Forbes (@Forbes) posted at 5:00 AM on Fri, Feb 07, 2025:
AG Pam Bondi Targets DEI At Private Companies And Universities On Day One https://t.co/vCqO7QoYlF
(https://x.com/Forbes/status/1887818640197579015?t=s7B1T7yJbxWaRNqvS-We5w&s=03)
Longtime Black Man Here (@groove_sdc) posted at 10:54 AM on Fri, Feb 07, 2025:
So her job is to stop Black people from getting hired or Black students from being admitted to schools?
(https://x.com/groove_sdc/status/1887907857867120732?t=qnVYmJjMFgHKK9d8e2r-BQ&s=03)
Christopher Webb (@cwebbonline) posted at 10:12 AM on Fri, Feb 07, 2025:
I’m so proud of our Democratic members of Congress right now. They’re being blocked from entering the Department of Education—and they’re not having it.
I can’t tag everyone in this video, but seeing Auntie Maxine ready to fight for our kids warms my soul. She hasn’t changed, thank God. @RepMaxineWaters isn’t my congresswoman, but we love her in this house!
https://t.co/V4FxbTHVwf
(https://x.com/cwebbonline/status/1887897201776754814?t=ZANVhwsEiH3aoexKHv32Xg&s=03)
Molly Ploofkins™ (@Mollyploofkins) posted at 9:11 AM on Fri, Feb 07, 2025:
Iowa farmers are getting contract rejection letters. https://t.co/XiLWB3tFGU
(https://x.com/Mollyploofkins/status/1887881755769864302?t=nCfE–YG8wuip_XQAIMT6g&s=03)
Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) posted at 7:19 AM on Thu, Feb 06, 2025:
ALLISON: I’m a black woman in this country… I have a law degree, a masters and two bachelor’s, probably more education that all of y’all added up. And I have always been the LEAST PAID person on payroll everywhere I’ve worked.
https://t.co/afWqOr92OJ
(https://x.com/EricLDaugh/status/1887491311915176085?t=hp8yuwy7nnGQnEWiQVJbeQ&s=03)
David Enrich (@davidenrich) posted at 9:45 AM on Fri, Feb 07, 2025:
Trump megadonor Steve Wynn has filed a petition asking the Supreme Court to overturn the landmark 1964 decision in New York Times v. Sullivan, which protects the media’s ability to aggressively cover public officials. https://t.co/GdAtLnJ0BW https://t.co/HUKXKDNj28
(https://x.com/davidenrich/status/1887890447399354818?t=_JgRoHx_U2cNTEspEBb8sQ&s=03)
Is it true that Mexicans are boycotting Coke, because they called ICE on their own workers?
I can’t say that I’ve been despondent since the election, but, I have been down.
Been thinking that it would be along two years.
Then, I heard about those special Congressional Elections in Florida.
The Democrats need to GO ALL PHUCKING IN.
PERIOD.
These ghouls have done so much AWFUL stuff SO FAST, that I do believe just telling the phucking truth about WHAT THEY ARE DOING can get through.
They’ve done something. ACTUAL something. Not ‘theoretical’ where the Republican Leaning voter could cover themselves in denial before November.
Needs to be boots on the ground and put everything we can into these special elections.
And, I agree with a poster on another blog, who said that NY Dems need to play phucking hardball and delay that special election for as long as possible. PERIOD.
Why can’t we use this insanity in ads for those Congressional Special Elections in FLORIDA?
David Pepper (@DavidPepper) posted at 11:00 AM on Fri, Feb 07, 2025:
Unfortunately, the next DOGE target looks to be the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which includes the National Weather Service and National Hurricane Center.
DOGE apparently informed senior staff to plan to reduce its staff by 50% and funding by 30%.
1/
David Pepper (@DavidPepper) posted at 11:00 AM on Fri, Feb 07, 2025:
Long-time subscribers of mine know this comes right out of Project 2025—and is motivated by anger that NOAA responsibly tracks and studies climate change and its impact on severe weather.
According to Project 2025, the NOAA “has become one of the main drivers of the climate change alarm industry and, as such, is harmful to future U.S. prosperity.” Its focus, Project 2025 alleges, “seems designed around the fatal conceit of planning for the unplannable.”
2/
David Pepper (@DavidPepper) posted at 11:00 AM on Fri, Feb 07, 2025:
That’s right, Project 2025 declared its opposition to trying to plan for future weather events, and now DOGE is acting on that..
As a result, NOAA “should be broken up and downsized.”
Project 2025 proposed:
3/
(https://x.com/DavidPepper/status/1887909376561734129?t=kopeiLFdiv58Ay9IVK-73g&s=03)
USAID purchases about $2 BILLION a year of rice, wheat, lentils and peas from American farmers.
found this at another blog:
Kay
February 7, 2025 at 6:57 am
Greenlanders on Reddit immediately made the connection between “relocating” (forcible removal) of the population of Gaza by the US and Israeli Right and “relocating” the indigenous Greenlanders because the US Right and Putin want the land.
I think tying the Right to these policies internationally could help to stop the international drift to fascism, even if it doesn’t save the US. They can “relocate” anyone. No one is safe.
So….
47 Announces his intentions to basically turn Gaza into Beachfront Condos and the Palestinians are told they gonna have to G-T-F-O-T
And yet……
where are the protests on college campuses?
where are they?
Good Morning Everyone 😊😊😊