Boots & Sabers

The blogging will continue until morale improves...

Category: Politics

America Can’t Afford to Pay for Other People’s Stuff Anymore

With respect, we have learned that the vast majority of the money that Americans have been spending on these programs was not reaching them. Most of it was being wasted or stolen.

Further, we’re broke. We have a $36 TRILLION debt and it’s continuing to rise. Even if these programs are worthy and good, American can’t afford to support all of them. The rest of the world has to step up. We’re tapped out and need to get our financial house in order before paying for other people’s stuff.

President Donald Trump’s freeze of U.S. foreign humanitarian aid and shuttering of the U.S. Agency for International Development is having devastating consequences globally, several humanitarian nongovernmental organization leaders told ABC News.

 

“The United States Government provides about 70% of all funding for HIV and AIDS globally, and so pausing any of that is a big shock to the system,” said Christine Stegling, a deputy executive director of the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) and an assistant secretary-general of the United Nations.

 

[…]

 

“Community clinics are closed because communities are not sure what the guidance is, and they’re not sure what costs can be covered, and they’re afraid that they will be asked to repay services that they have charged to U.S. government contracts,” Stegling told ABC News.

Democrat Removes Reproductive Organs in Response to Trump Win

If you are removing body parts in response to an election, you are not mentally stable. This woman should not be entrusted with making laws for others.

LANSING, Mich. (AP) — A Michigan state lawmaker told a crowd protesting President Trump’s early actions this week that she underwent elective surgery to remove her reproductive organs.

 

State Rep. Laurie Pohutsky’s account was cheered by the left-leaning protestors and condemned by right-wing social media accounts.

 

The 36-year-old Democrat said the surgery was a personal decision she had been considering for a few years and was finalized by Trump’s election. She wanted to validate the fears other women might have about access to contraception by sharing it.

Rogue Judge Stops DOGE

This is as expected as it is ridiculous. Presidents have been appointing special envoys or special project people to do things. DOGE’s power and authority comes from the President himself.

A federal judge has blocked Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (Doge) from accessing the personal financial data of millions of Americans in Treasury Department records, according to court documents.

 

US District Judge Paul A. Engelmayer issued a preliminary injunction on Saturday to prohibit access, ordering Musk and his team to immediately destroy any copies of records.

 

The move comes after 19 state attorneys general sued the Trump administration after Doge, a cost-cutting initiative led by Musk, was given access to the records.

 

They argued access for Musk, a “special government employee”, and Doge, which is not an official government department, violated federal law.

Bureaucrat Rebellion

Their entitlement is insufferable.

Undergirding a fight formed in group texts and between cubicles is a conviction among nonpartisan civil servants that they provide a necessary check on Trump’s power. In interviews with The Washington Post, dozens of federal employees said their alarm was not rooted in political differences but in a desire to preserve democracy. They spoke on the condition of anonymity to avoid professional retribution but saw talking to the press at all, which violates agency policies, as an act of defiance.

They are proving that they are the deep state that Trump says they are. In a representative government, the People elect people at the top to enact the will of the People. If the bureaucrats really want to “preserve democracy,” then they would adhere to the will of the People as reflected in the President they elected. This rebellion of the bureaucrats is a blow against democracy. Nobody elected them.

DOGE v. USAID

DOGE for the win. It appears that USAID was just a gigantic grift machine. How many agencies does our government need to dole out our cash?

Two top security officials at the US Agency for International Development were put on administrative leave Saturday night after attempting to refuse officials from Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency access systems at the agency, even after DOGE personnel threatened to call law enforcement, multiple sources familiar told CNN.

According to sources, personnel from the Musk-created office physically tried to access the USAID headquarters in Washington, DC, and were stopped. The DOGE personnel demanded to be let in and threatened to call US Marshals to be allowed access, two of the sources said.

The DOGE personnel wanted to gain access to USAID security systems and personnel files, three sources said. Two of those sources also said the DOGE personnel wanted access to classified information, which only those with security clearances and a specific need to know are able to access.

[…]

The condemnation from the tech billionaire underscores mounting reports that President Donald Trump intends to abolish USAID, an independent federal agency, and fold it into the US State Department. Other top Trump officials, such as Stephen Miller, who serves as deputy chief of staff for policy at the White House, have also taken aim at USAID, accusing its workforce of being overwhelmingly Democrats.

On Saturday, USAID’s website went dark and a new page for the agency appeared on the State Department website. USAID’s X account also went offline Saturday.

Shortly after being sworn in last month, Trump issued a sweeping executive order pausing all foreign aid for 90 days, leading to widespread confusion, layoffs and program shutdowns.

USAID Director of Security John Voorhees and his deputy are among dozens of USAID officials who have been put on leave amid fears that the agency is being intentionally dismantled — a move that some aid officials argue would have massive negative implications.

Tariff War Commences

I wholeheartedly oppose tariffs. There is an academic and historic argument to be made in favor of tariffs, but experience in a global economy teaches us that they do more harm than good. That being said, Trump promised tariffs when he was running and he was elected. He’s keeping his promise about something he believes in. I just think he’s wrong and voted for him for other reasons. I hope that the consequences are tolerable.

Canadian Finance Minister Dominic LeBlanc on Sunday unveiled the full list of items covered by tariffs on $30 billion worth of US goods, the first phase of Canada’s response to US tariffs.

The items include American produce, alcohol, apparel, household appliances, tools, firearms and more.

Canada’s tariffs come in retaliation after US President Donald Trump on Saturday announced sweeping levies on Canada, Mexico and China.

 

Trump Signs School Choice Order

Excellent!

The order involves multiple agencies in the effort to provide taxpayer funds to parents to pay for private schools.

 

Among its directives, the Department of Education – which Trump has vowed to shut down – is ordered to issue guidance on using federal funding to support scholarship programs for grade school students. The Department of Defense is ordered to submit a plan to Trump directly on how military families can use DOD funds to send children to their preferred school. The secretary of interior is ordered to submit a plan to Trump on how families with students attending Bureau of Indian Education schools can use federal money to attend the school of their choice. And the Health and Human Services Department must issue guidance on how states can use HHS funds to attend private or faith-based schools.

Trump Offers Employee Buyout

This is brilliant… sort of. This is a technique that private companies have used for some time. When a company knows that it will need to downsize, offering a generous buyout for employees is a good way to ease the decision for the employer and the employee. The next step, of course, is letting people go to get the organization down to the right size. I don’t think, however, that this sort of widescale technique has been used in government. And frankly, with all of the employment turmoil our economy has seen through the pandemic – much of that turmoil caused by government employees who sat securely in their jobs – my “give a darn” about their complaints is pretty much gone.

President Donald Trump’s administration is offering federal workers the chance to take a “deferred resignation,” which would mean they agree now to resign but get paid through September.

 

A senior administration official told NBC News that they expect 5%-10% of the federal workforce to quit, which, they estimate, could lead to around $100 billion in savings.

 

All full-time federal employees are eligible, except for members of the military, employees of the U.S. Postal Service, positions related to immigration enforcement and national security and other jobs excluded by agencies.

 

[…]

 

The offer went out to the federal workforce through a new system the Trump administration set up that gives officials the ability to email all federal employees at once.

 

The email included a draft resignation letter for them to review. If a person wishes to resign, they will be able to reply with the word “resign.”

 

The resignation period will begin Tuesday and go through Feb. 6.

“If you choose to remain in your current position, we thank you for your renewed focus on serving the American people to the best of your abilities and look forward to working together as part of an improved federal workforce,” the email that will be sent to federal workers reads. “At this time, we cannot give you full assurance regarding the certainty of your position or agency but should your position be eliminated you will be treated with dignity and will be afforded the protections in place for such positions.”

Trump Pauses Federal Grants, Loans, etc.

A pause is great. Hopefully this is the first step to ending many of these. There are entire organizations created for the purpose of receiving federal grants that do almost nothing. End the gravy train and let those people find something more productive to do.

President Donald Trump has temporarily paused all federal grant, loan and other financial assistance programs, a leaked memo has revealed.

 

The White House budget office has ordered federal agencies to ‘temporarily pause all activities related to obligation or disbursement of all Federal financial assistance’.

 

The temporary pause will not affect Social Security or Medicare benefits, the memo specifies. It also does not include ‘assistance provided directly to individuals’.

 

The suspension goes into effect today at 5pm EST, according to the memo. Agencies have until February 10 to submit detailed information on any programs, projects or activities subject to the pause.

 

The suspension will provide the administration with time to review agency programs and determine the best uses of funding for those programs consistent with the law and Trump’s priorities.

Birth Tourist Guide Sentenced

“Obama era” wha!?!

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A California woman was sentenced Monday to more than 3 years in prison in a long-running case over a business that helped pregnant Chinese women travel to the United States to deliver babies who automatically became American citizens.

 

U.S. District Judge R. Gary Klausner gave Phoebe Dong a 41-month sentence and ordered her immediately taken into custody from his federal court in Los Angeles. Dong and her husband were convicted in September of conspiracy and money laundering through their company, USA Happy Baby.

 

The sentencing came as birthright citizenship has been thrust into the spotlight in the United States with the return of President Donald Trump to the White House. Since taking office, Trump issued an executive order to narrow the definition of birthright citizenship, a move quickly blocked by a federal judge who called it “blatantly unconstitutional.”

 

Dong and her husband, Michael Liu, were among more than a dozen people charged in an Obama-era crackdown on so-called “birth tourism” schemes that helped Chinese women hide their pregnancies while traveling to the United States to give birth. Such businesses have long operated in various states catering to people from China, Russia, Nigeria and elsewhere.

 

[…]

 

Federal prosecutors sought a more than five year sentence for Dong and argued that she and Liu helped more than 100 pregnant Chinese women travel to the United States. They said the pair worked with others to coach women on how to trick customs officials by flying into airports believed to be more lax while wearing loose-fitting clothing to hide their pregnancies.

Some Thoughts on Work From Home and Federal Employees

As Trump orders all federal workers back to the office, we should think about what federal work should look like in the years to come.

Let us recognize that federal workers have completely abused work from home (WFH) policies. When the pandemic hit, they all went home and never came back – even long after all private sector workers had returned to work. The result is a largely absent federal workforce and empty buildings. By ordering them all back into the office, Trump is returning the office status quo to March of 2020.

From there, we need to have a common sense WFH standard for federal employees. I do have an informed perspective here. I was a hybrid worker from about 2004 to 2013 and have been full WFH since. It’s not for everybody. You have to have self-discipline, a quality workspace, and a family that understands that when you’re at work… you’re at work. Also, not all jobs lend themselves to WFH. Many obviously require someone to be at an office or job site. And for some companies and departments, they just work better if the people doing the work are in the same physical space. It works for me and my job, but I’ve seen people in the same line of work do poorly working from home. And I’ve seen people who are exceptionally effective working from home and get distracted in an office environment. It takes the right job and the right person.

That being said, as I said, we need a common sense WFH standard for federal employees. First, we need to identify the jobs that can be done by people working from home or in an office. These are generally jobs in which output can be readily measured and physical proximity is not needed. Clerical jobs, research, data processing, IT, administration, some management, call center, etc. all lend themselves to WFH. Healthcare, military, public-facing, secure, and other jobs, do not work for WFH.

Once we have defined the jobs that are workable for WFH, we have to define the parameters by which those jobs will be done. How will equipment be handled? How will data be secured? Appropriate workplace standards? Employee measurement criteria? Video and monitoring protocols? Etc. The private sector has been thoughtfully working through all of this for 20 years and has a lot of it figured out.

Then we have to allow some latitude for individual departments and teams to decide if they want WFH or not. There has to be some discretion if a particular department (State, for example) wants everyone in the office to foster the culture they want. There isn’t a one-size-fits-all answer here.

Finally, for those departments and jobs that we think are OK for people to do from home and we have established the appropriate measurements and protocols, not every employee is going to cut it. Some of them lack the self-discipline or home environment to be successful working from home. If the job is ONLY available WFH because we close the office, then they must be replaced.

There are some benefits for WFH for our country. It will allow us to divest from a fair amount of real estate. More importantly, it will allow people all over the country to work for the federal government – not just those who live near a federal office. This opens up the labor pool and diversifies the imprint and impact of a giant glob of federal employees clustered around federal offices.

We can have a thoughtful policy for WFH that works for employees and taxpayers. My own impression is that most federal jobs still need to happen in an office, but I also think that most federal jobs (outside of the military) are not necessary.

Senate Republicans Are Disappointing Out of the Gate with Slow Confirmation Process

Previous presidents whose own party controlled the Senate got their confirmations done in days. We’re at the end of the first week and just getting to the second cabinet confirmation? Come on, Republicans. Get it together. Confirm the cabinet and let’s get to work.

Pete Hegseth, President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Pentagon, cleared a key procedural hurdle in the Senate on Thursday to advance his nomination.

 

The vote on ending debate came down to the wire, though Hegseth ultimately secured 51 Republican votes to move forward.

 

A final confirmation vote on Hegseth could now occur as soon as Friday or early Saturday.

Trump Orders Declassification of JFK, RFK, and MLK Assassination Files

Enough time has passed that whatever is in there is part of our history that we deserve to know. I suspect, however, that even after they are released, we will still have more questions than answers. Not every fact is always written down. And not everything written down is a fact. But to have a complete historical record to evaluate when trying to get to the truth is vital.

For the record, I think that Oswald killed JFK just like we’ve been told for years. But I also think that his hostile communist radicalism was nurtured by the Soviet Union and ignored (intentionally?) by the CIA for years.

US President Donald Trump has ordered officials to make plans to declassify documents related to three of the most consequential assassinations in US history – the killings of John F Kennedy, Robert F Kennedy, and Martin Luther King Jr.

 

“A lot of people are waiting for this for long, for years, for decades,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on Thursday. “And everything will be revealed.”

 

The order directs top administration officials to present a plan to declassify the documents within 15 days. That does not make it certain it will happen, however.

Ending Birthright Citizenship

Interesting.

Democratic states this week made clear that Donald Trump faces a bitter legal fight if he pushes ahead with plans to end birthright citizenship, but an exclusive poll for DailyMail.com shows that the president has America’s backing.

 

After his inauguration on Monday, Trump ordered officials not to recognize the citizenship of children born in the U.S. if neither their mother or father is a U.S. citizen or legal permanent resident.

 

J.L. Partners polled 1,009 registered voters ahead of Trump’s inauguration asked them: ‘Currently, when someone is born in the United States they immediately become a citizen, regardless of their country of origin or their parents’ citizenship status. This is called ‘birthright citizenship’.

 

‘Do you support or oppose the removal of birthright citizenship?’

 

Some 48 percent of respondents said they supported removal and 26 percent said they supported it strongly.

 

In contrast, 32 percent said they opposed it, 23 percent strongly.

There are two questions here. What is the law? Is it good policy? Let’s start with the first.

This is the relevant part of the Constitution:

All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.

For my entire lifetime, at least, this has been interpreted to mean that if you are born on the soil of the U.S. or born of citizen parents, then you are also a citizen. That is how I have always assumed it was correctly interpreted. The phrase in dispute in the “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” part. What does that mean?

To be subject to a government’s jurisdiction, it logically means that you are part of the community and subject to the normal laws as everyone else. If you are born in this nation to illegal aliens, are you really under our jurisdiction? You aren’t filing taxes, getting insurance, adhering to labor laws, etc. You are living in the shadows.

Remember that this sentence was written after the Civil War to naturalize former slaves and ensure that they have full citizenship. In that case, the former slaves were born in the nation and they were undeniably subject to its jurisdiction – by force. In the case of people born of illegal aliens, they are neither forced nor allowed to live under the same jurisdiction as citizens.

I expect that despite the logical argument, this is a reach for the law because of the century of accepted interpretation of this clause. I don’t think it’s been fully litigated, but that’s because the interpretation of birthright citizenship was so accepted that nobody thought to challenge it. Trump is challenging it.

Is this good policy? Here’s an enlightening visual:

CDN media

It is, by no means, a God-given right nor universally accepted good policy to grant citizenship by virtue of where you are born. While not universal, the trend is that younger countries have the Rule of Land and older countries have the Rule of Blood. Why? Partially because during the age of exploration, new countries needed to attract people to settle there. Partially because that’s what was in vogue at the time the laws were made.

As a populous and settled country that readily attracts immigrants, the U.S. does not need the Rule of Land to grow our population. We should maintain a healthy flow of immigrants, but we can do so with thoughtfulness of our nation’s needs and compassionate about refugees. We do not need to grant citizenship to a person just because their mom found her way onto American soil to give birth. This is especially true when we see so many people exploiting this rule.

So, yes, it would be good policy to move the U.S. to the Rule of Blood, but I expect that we will find that it will take a Constitutional Amendment to get there.

The Bloat of the Federal Government

You can never convince me that this many people are necessary for these agencies and some of these agencies should not exist.

The US Office of Personnel Management showed eight cabinet-level agencies, which are at the center of the executive branch and have heads that report directly to the president, had more than 100,000 civilian employees as of March.

 

Almost half a million people were employed in the Department of Veterans Affairs, while the Department of Education had just over 4,000. The Treasury Department had more than 100,000 employees as of March. The overwhelming majority of those — about 94,000 — were employed in the Internal Revenue Service.

 

Most departments had six-figure average salaries, with the Department of Education and the Department of Energy having the highest averages.

 

[…]

 

“The point is not to be cruel or to have people not be able to pay their mortgage or anything,” Musk said during his October remarks, adding, “We just have too many people in the government sector, and they could be more productive elsewhere.”

DOJ Employee Not Given Reason for Firing

Welcome to At Will employment.

A former top Justice Department immigration official who was removed from her position by new DOJ leadership this week told ABC News that she did not receive any explanation for her removal.

 

Lauren Alder Reid was one of four top officials from the agency that operates the U.S. immigration courts who was removed from her post. She had been with the agency for more than 14 years.

 

“They did not give me any reason, other than not citing the 16 years of outstanding performance evaluation for lack of any discipline, administrative leave or reassignment in my entire career,” Reid told ABC News.

Biden’s Note to Trump

All cynicism aside, that’s a beautiful note and I, too, pray for God’s guidance and that the “coming years will be a time of prosperity, peace, and grace for our nation.”

“Dear President Trump, As I take leave of this sacred office I wish you and your family all the best in the next four years,” Biden wrote. “The American people – and people around the world – look to this house for steadiness in the inevitable storms of history, and my prayer is that in the coming years will be a time of prosperity, peace, and grace for our nation.”

 

“May God bless you and guide you as He has blessed and guided our beloved country since our founding,” Biden concluded the note, before signing it and dating it Jan. 20.

Trump Sends DEI Employees Home

Yes. Not only are these programs destructive and a distraction from the agencies’ core missions, it is another expense that we can’t afford. Even if you support these DEI initiatives, they are clearly a “nice to have” that we can’t indulge when we’re broke.

CNN — 

Employees in any federal diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility offices will be placed on paid administrative leave “effective immediately,” according to a post from White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt.

Slashing jobs in federal DEI positions is one move in a series of actions taken by the new administration, after Donald Trump promised to wage a war against such programs and take on the practice on Day 1. Trump has already cut high-profile military personnel and ended the use of DEI in hiring and federal contracting. Some major companies have taken similar measures as they face pressure from conservative critics and customers.

A memo issued by the US Office of Personnel Management on Tuesday instructed agencies to notify DEI staffers “no later than 5:00pm EST on Wednesday” that they were being placed on administrative leave effective immediately as “the agency takes steps to close/end all DEIA initiatives, offices and programs.”

The memo also directs agencies to remove the offices’ websites and social media accounts and to cancel any DEI-related trainings.

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