You may have noticed that we had a budget deficit in the last fiscal year of $1.8 trillion. In five years, our annual expenditures increased $2.5 trillion per year. They have never come down from the year of the international pandemic. Yet with the new government in Washington moving toward cuts, one would think an asteroid the size of Mars is headed toward the planet when any budget cuts are mentioned. What are they willing to cut?
The non-military federal workforce has increased 30% in the last 25 years.
This is an era where private industry companies have cut personnel because of technological advancements. Our population increased 21% during this period of time. The government has grown in all respects yet apparently there is an element of the country that thinks we can’t cut anything despite the staggering numbers laid out above.
The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has projected that, if we continue on our current trajectory, we will have an annual budget deficit of $2.9 trillion. Raising taxes on the “rich” or “corporations” is not the answer. Revenues keep going up every year, accelerated by the Trump tax plan that took effect in 2018. The ignorant projections of how much additional revenue would be generated if the tax rate adjustments expire at the end of 2025 falsely assume static activities by taxpayers if there are no tax rate adjustments. That never happens.
When Senator Tom Coburn was in the U.S. Senate, every year he put out “The Wastebook.” A few senators have partially continued this tradition. But with a budget that allocates $6.75 trillion, our government is far too large and has too many agencies and bureaus. Money is allocated in broad strokes and the decision on the expenditure is left in the hands of unelected officials by the nature of the beast and with tacit approval of Congress.
I had an encounter with a congressperson in the early 2000’s when there were elevator operators in the Congressional building. This was forty years after Shirley MacLaine played one in the classic movie, The Apartment, and at least 30 years after the positions should have been eliminated. He responded by attacking me for focusing on such a minor expenditure. I countered to him that all these minor wasteful expenses add up to a big deficit and a blatant display that “they just don’t care about our money.” Nothing has changed much in the past 20 years.
What will convince our elected officials that matters are out of hand? A recent article in the New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/03/us/politics/musk-federal-government.html defined the issue (though it was not until the 43rd paragraph while they attacked DOGE). The Biden Administration identified $236 BILLION of fraudulent payments made by the federal government in 2023. That is not Musk; it is not Trump; that is the Democrat operated Government Accountability Office who said that, and they don’t seem to want to do anything about it. You think they would be screaming about that and marching in the streets to stop it.
They actively ignore taking any responsibility. Julie Su was the California Labor Secretary who oversaw $30 billion of unemployment payment fraud. You would think they would never let her near any government program again. Instead, the Biden Administration brought her to Washington to become Deputy Secretary of Labor. When the Secretary, Marty Walsh, left Biden nominated her to replace him. After she was unable to receive approval by the U.S. Senate, Biden illegally kept her in the position. God knows what destruction she caused, but we will soon find out.
Numerous times when reading about the multiple misappropriations at USAID which I had covered previously to the new administration, I have encountered the same argument which is used to justify the irresponsible actions. The argument goes “Why is Trump targeting this agency it is only 1% (actually .6%) of the budget.” That is $40 billion. $40 billion of our dollars and we should just let it slide.
Instead, they are more concerned with protecting expenditures. An inside government newsletter I receive recently stated, “Democrat senators this week warned that Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., President Donald Trump’s nominee for Health and Human Services secretary, intends to fire potentially thousands of federal employees.” There is never a realization of the huge imbalance in our federal budget. Only fear mongering.
I recently interviewed Mark Moyer about the treacherous treatment he received as delineated in his book, Masters of Corruption. When asked about the potential dismantling of USIAD, he told me “The bureaucracy invited its own dismantling through a combination of insubordination, corruption, and pursuit of left-wing ideological agendas.”
They are complaining about the Executive branch usurping the Legislative branch’s legal rights regarding expenditures. The problem is legislators have turned over their rights to the Executive branch by blanket allocations they make in their sloppily written bills. The Executive branch is exercising its legal authority.
Emblematic of the problem is Texas Congressman Greg Casar, the new head of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. Instead of saying one thing positive he fearmongered. He said Musk wants to shut down Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security. Does he really believe that? Does he believe that in these massive programs there are no fraudulent payments being made and there is no overstaffing in departments? Of course there is. If Casar wanted to really protect those programs he would want to root out the irresponsible expenditures.
Please let me know who and what specific program they are willing to cut. The only thing I have heard is Lizzie Warren argued for cuts in the Defense budget. No argument from me. I wrote a column recently questioning how we are spending $880 billion and don’t have money for ships, airplanes, bullets, and bombs. But Senator Warren, there is also mass misconduct across all the departments.
It is about time someone stopped just talking about waste, fraud, and abuse in our government and did something about it. Hallelujah. Hopefully, my Democrat friends will join us.
