By this I mean that we have an Auto-Immune problem as we devour ourselves alive. The first briefing is on the Federal Government arising from the remains of the Trumpist gluttonous assault. The next post will have some comments based on what I know about the other AI--artificial intelligence--and what we should be looking to do about it.
A Functional View of the Federal Government
The Constitution says that all of it is divided in three parts.* Structurally, that is somewhat true; Congress and our court system remain, and I will expect that they will survive the coming disaster intact; however, those two branches are not very important in the gigantic money/power game of Washington, now that Congress has yielded control of the purse strings to Emperor Elon. Those two branches have become, at best, referees; realistically, bystanders and check-writers; and in the worst case, servile order-takers. All the action, though, is in the Executive Branch, the result of several decades of gradually increasing powers to the President, increasing difficulty for effective oversight for it, and the ascension of an individual without restraint in using its powers.
I identify four main functions of our central government; I will describe each briefly, and then consider what damage is most likely to it from The D------d's maladministration in the next four years.
The first is the set of functions which maintain the constitutional structure itself. So far, I don't see Trump successfully destroying it, as he finds its cracks and limitations very useful, and more often than not he gets what he wants from it in the end. For example, many feel that defying court orders will mean the end of "rule of law". Apart from the fact that the only people who really believe we can rely on that to be applied fairly are lawyers, and rapidly less of them, I don't see an authentic legal battle royal arising from this type of unlawful action, which--in the few cases the administration actually definitively loses--will be deflected, appealed, delayed, and if necessary, ignored. Apart from that, these operations (such as in the Executive Office, Congressional operations, court officers, the Archives) will be the part most stubbornly defended, even sometimes by Republicans. Generally, the institutions behind them survive even in the absence of democratic governance, though their functions are gutted or corrupted. In our 21st-century politics, they are extremely difficult to modify, partly due to the partisan stalemate, and also because they are designed to be resistant to much change. Governmental institutions provide some legitimacy even to the worst regimes; if they disappear, it's worse than just a failed state, it's near-anarchy.
The second area is taking the revenues or other funds and paying them out. This is the big growth area of government in the 20th century, but we seem to find that growth to be too much for us today. The DOGE boys are focusing on this one, because "that's where the money is", as the historic bankrobber said. There are vast areas for potential abuse and theft in this function, which is something like 15% of our entire GDP, a few trillion dollars a year. Some, like Social Security, are paid directly to US persons,, and those will be extremely difficult to cut because of the political pain involved. The better targets are the pass-through payments through middle-men; USAID may be very beneficial, but it's a middleman that passes money to other middlemen, and that's why it's a viable target. That, and the fact that there is little or no political cost to cutting any or all foreign aid in this self-centered political environment. Medicare and Medicaid are indirect payments for the most part, and they will be targeted indirectly--cutting those outlays will end up being the principal function of unworthy HHS Secretary Kennedy. Look for less of those medical tests that doctors order to cover all possibilities being approved in advance.
SNAP (food stamps) is a bit of a functional hybrid, as the benefit is direct to the consumer, but the payments are to the food providers; I don't know about its efficiency as a program, but it can't be eliminated and could become very important in the next domestic economic crisis. Similarly, FEMA generally provides benefits one step removed from the direct recipients; that is an agency that is easy to criticize but will become even more indispensable in the future.
In general, there are going to be permanent reductions in the transfers from our taxpayer dollars to most categories of recipients.. Whether this is a positive or negative would depend on your relation to the indirect US payments which are going to reduce. There are exceptions, though: I see the Department of Energy getting more money to subsidize a return to nuclear power in private industry, in order to enhance crypto, in the short run, and to reduce our fossil fuel dependence in the future; also, I see Trump passing more money to Elon, Inc. because Space--Trump digs it.
I want to say something here about the deadline for Congress to do something to head off a government shutdown and subsequent default. Although Trump pats Speaker Johnson on the back and says "go to it", Johnson's task--to fund all of Trump's spending and tax cuts--is next to impossible with just his Republican House conference and no Democratic votes. The Mumps know this and are enjoying it; I believe that one scenario they like is a a brief cessation of most "non-essential" Federal functions, and then being able to selectively re-start the ones they want. Of course, if they get everything they want from a suppliant Congress, that's great, too, but it's got to be everything. So, it's hard to believe that will happen unless the House Republicans get more unified by desperation than they appear to be. The Democrats don't want a shutdown as such, but they do want the situation where Johnson needs votes, and they are preparing their demands. An end to the illegal usurpation of control of spending is part of them, I know, a part that I don't think they will get. I'd say probability of a shutdown of any length in March is about 80%, though the length of it is harder to estimate.
I see a populist opportunity to make this principal government function more one of moving money or wealth from those who have a whole lot of it to the less-wealthy, something that should be popular. That may even become essential to keep the peace internally, but the only route I can see that happening during Trump 2.0 is a necessary, bipartisan recognition that the cutoff income on earners' Social Security tax must go. And that will only happen if the Democratic lawmakers can insist on it in the few cases--there may be only one--where they will have some leverage on Congress during Drumpfenreich. They must do it (demographic tick-tick)! Look for tax rates to be the cleavage point Democrats can push in 2028.
The third area is composed of those areas of actual services that the Federal government provides. These are fewer than you might think. Start with the Veterans Administration, the National Park Service, and then the big one, our military, the service in that case being our national security ("Thank you for your service!"). These are going to be hard to cut significantly; there will be savings found in Defense, but a lot more spending than those cuts will be forthcoming, especially in a needed effort to try to ramp up lagging enlistments. There are some smaller service areas (in terms of expenditure) that might be more vulnerable to Mump attack: the Federal Reserve (banks get lots of service), the hated Internal Revenue Service (in my view, pretty efficient and user-friendly compared to state tax agencies), and the Foreign Service. The State Department is, again, an easy target temporarily, though I believe it will get new attention, post-Trump, as being much less costly to get favorable outcomes than the military route. Most Federal government services (apart from the military) have a pretty bad popular reputation, deserved or not, but they are not going away.
The fourth area, and the one that is most vulnerable of all of them, is the set of agencies whose principal functions are making, and enforcing, rules and regulations. Here we've got a lot of alphabet soup: EPA, OSHA, FDA, NRC, SEC, FEC, NLRB, and ACA (a/k/a Obamacare). Any long-term legal basis for these organizations to maintain themselves was gutted last year by the Supreme Court; their very survival depends on continued goodwill from the Executive. ACA has a statutory basis but that means nothing without the subsidy transfer payments which go alongside, the money going to insurers. Within this category, there are a couple other agencies the functions of which also combine the two most vulnerable areas, both giving money to entities and making rules. That's the Department of Education and the National Institute of Health, both prime Muskrat targets.
The Best, the OK, and Worst of the So Far
In terms of assessing the value and liabilities (to the US) arising from the whirlwind of activity and blather in these early days, there is the challenge of looking at the downstream effects, including the unintended ones. As with Biden's successful legislative initiatives, it will take years to realize them--that is, for the real effects to show, economically, politically, and otherwise.
I will give credit to the Trump administration for two of their many initiatives. First, it's time finally to get rid of the penny. I would combine that with increased production of the half-dollar and dollar coins--I wouldn't even mind if the God Emperor and his Presidential assistant were stamped onto one of them together, but only one (they could put a picture of the Gulf of D------d I on the back). The second is Trump's strategy in applying his favorite tool, tariffs. The deceptive part of the tariff strategy is that he probably thinks it's a source of revenue to cover some of the new tax cuts (and renewal of the ones from his last term). In that he will be disappointed; however, the move toward reciprocal application of tariffs, instead of unilateral ones (which wouldn't remain unilateral for long) is sensible. If successful, it could actually help reduce prices on some imports, which is not what we were expecting.
I will give a guarded "OK" rating on Trump's rapid successes in getting his Cabinet and top "leadership" positions in his administration approved. (I'm not referring to Musk, here, as a different description of his role applies.) We need to accept the general rule that Presidents can choose their principal direct reports in most cases. There were a couple, or a few, qualified folks, such as Rubio at State, or Bessent at Treasury. There were many, many whose main qualification was loyalty to Trump, but who will be in roles where the damage they will be required to cause is less, because the political leverage for his abuse through them is also less--not that they will produce anything of value (e.g. Interior, Commerce, all the ambassadors he gifted cushy jobs). There are a couple in hugely important roles for our nation who are terrible appointments, but because they are so incapable of adding value they will just be ignored, or overruled (Hesgeth, Gabbard). So far, Pam Bondi looks to be one of those who relied on lies and her good looks to get approved and will turn out to be much worse than we thought. The one I despise most, Kennedy in HHS, is awful, but just how much actual damage he will do to our health is yet to be clear, because he dissembled his way through all the contradictions between his own policies and the administration's. The worst will be Patel in the FBI, but I am 100% certain he will not make it through his ten-year appointment; if he makes it through ten months, that will be a lot. I expect about the same for the likes of Hesgeth and Gabbard, whose roles continue at the sufferance of the President.
As for his foreign policy so far, I'm pleased he hasn't taken any real-world moves yet, but I'm not optimistic. He looks ready to do Ukraine dirty. I understand that Trump is under a lot of pressure to make a deal with Putin quickly, given his campaign promise. Bringing Ukraine's Zelensky into the negotiations would slow things down, so he will look to have him or his representatives in the next room, not the one "where it happens". As things proceed I will make more comments on this and try to draw some lines in the ground (or "in the air") on items he must, or must not, agree with Putin to impose on Ukraine.
I've said enough about how his attitude will play in the other countries making up the rest of America--not well, in general, but the dictators there will successfully play him. As for the Middle East, I think his stupid Gaza ethnic-cleansing-idea burn scars will teach him very quickly that he should try to stay out of it and believe less in Netanyahu's false assurances, except to cultivate Saudi money for himself and his family. Finally, the relationship that's long-term most important, with China, will be fascinating to watch. I am hopeful that he will give Xi the respect that will make all the difference, despite all the potential areas of conflict (economic and worse).
So, not great, but, like challenging the constitution, he hasn't done the Really Bad Thing yet--we can hope he won't. The Ukraine war has shown us just how bad 21st-century war is--random, inhuman, destruction with no inherent limitation.
With regard to the much-touted "mass deportations", let's be real. This administration is headed down a path bound to fail to satisfy anyone. There will be deportations, as there always are and will be; they might be marginally higher than previous administrations, but the goal should be to avoid political disaster, which can only be accomplished by being more circumspect about them and considering the characteristics of the individuals captured more closely. So far, reports are quite bad; they could get much worse.
When we look at the very worst of Trump's first month in the job, it's the preparations for extreme corruption and double-dealing. The firing of the head of the Office of Government Ethics and of several departmental Inspectors General cannot be justified and can only be understood as taking away friction from his future plans for slimy abuses and theft. The other thing that looks extremely suspicious to me was the capture of the Treasury Department's database. They lied about whether the access was "Read-Only"; c'mon, these kids are coders. I'm not sure whether they were able to download data, which would be illegal (and Elon's wet dream), but what I suspect is that they have put in some backdoor shit which would allow Trump to have a kill-switch on any given payment. That may be why some frozen payments which the courts have ordered to be restored have not yet resumed.
The major damage he's making across our Federal civil service will take 5-10 years to reverse, in order to restore qualified pros to departments' middle levels. The "spoil system" is back, and it will take an enlightened administration to end it again for this century's government. Whether through firings, voluntary retirement, intimidated resignation, or the so-called "buyouts", the best civil servants will be leaving, understandably given the directions they would otherwise be given to administer.. The damage caused by this devolution of human resources will be largely inseparable from all that is caused by the administration's policies, so the need to go back to the future may not be as obvious as it should be.
The big question is when Trump's finagling and assaults on our government will make their disastrous effects visible even to the low-information voters here. The basic scenario I am seeing is a run on the dollar, accompanied by increasing inflation along with increased unemployment. (Yes, he can!) Whether that will result in a recession sooner or later may depend on the direction of the Fed, but like the 2008 recession, it may be beyond the capability of monetary policy to control when it occurs, and in any case Trump's policies are consistently inflationary, so his promises to reduce prices have little or no validity..
Bottom line is that, like that Liberty Bell, our bell of liberty isn't ringing too clearly with that big crack. I'm hoping that, unlike a windshield crack, we can keep it from spreading throughout until we make the proper repair/replacement.
That's about all I ever plan to say about this damned administration, though I will return to foreign policy, along with the all-important state elections and the House ones in 2025-26 as opportunities to go into those prioritized subjects arise. I won't wish this crew good luck; they've already had more than they deserve. I have called this a constitutional crisis and a slow-motion train wreck for at least a decade now. The fact that some wheels ran off the rails once again is clear, but maybe a 21st-century train can find its way back to the station somehow.
* Like that previous Caesar said about Gaul.
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