It has been a rough week and a half. Two horrific plane crashes in one week seemed to serve to emphasize the travesties occurring simultaneously across our federal government as a result of the hundreds of rapid-fire executive orders coming from the white house. From firing top career FBI agents and DOJ officials who prosecuted January 6th insurrectionists and Donald Trump himself, to pardoning violent criminals who attacked the Capitol, to ensuring any plans for Martin Luther King Jr. Day or Black History Month celebrations were halted in the federal government, people are reeling. The utterly unqualified and in some cases dangerous Cabinet appointees that the Senate is green-lighting because Senators are afraid Elon Musk will throw substantial money at primarying them. The upcoming tariffs that economists agree will hobble our economy and disproportionately effect the poor and middle class. Oh, and did I mention that on January 20, 2025, Mike Whitaker, the head of the FAA resigned under pressure from the new administration, and on January 21, 2025, THG dismantled the FAA’s Aviation Safety Advisory board? Also, there is a federal hiring freeze across the board, even though we have a persistent shortage of air traffic controllers who, lest anyone forget, are also federal employees.

“I told you so” doesn’t begin to encapsulate it. TFG wasted no time trying to dismantle the government. On the 14th Amendment issue of Birthright citizenship, there has thus far been enough pushback to arrest the insanity, but he isn’t done yet. More importantly, the forces behind him are not done yet.

Brass tacks are we are currently in a position where our federal government has no checks and balances. The Orange Shit Gibbon in the White House and both houses of Congress are red, and we have a conservative supermajority on the Supreme Court which has deliberately tee’d up this moment in time with consistent rulings to ensure the success of fascist forces intent on demolishing democracy. Unlike his last administration which was bumbling and disorganized, this time Trump came in with the full force of a team set up by the Heritage Foundation and their detailed administrative agenda, Project 2025. It should not be a surprise to anyone that this was always the plan. It was published well ahead of the election. Despite Trump’s effort to distance himself from it, his VP, J.D. Vance, wrote the forward to it. And it frankly reflects much of what Trump said he wanted to do.

Then there is the added “complication” of Elon Musk. To be clear, he is also a narcissist with a very specific agenda that is clearly his alone regardless of any proclamation to the contrary. Part of his “work” at the newly created (not by Congress) Department Of Government Efficiency, is getting rid of government waste. What that translated to was firing 18 Inspectors General–the people who oversee various agencies and whose job it is to conduct independent investigations and audits of those agencies to detect and prevent waste, fraud, and abuse. Then, Musk sent letters inviting tens of thousands of federal employees to resign now and get paid through September of this year.

There are a few important takeaways of the firing of IG’s and attempt to get federal employees to just leave:

  1. Firing the IG’s, the watchdogs of federal agencies, indicates Elon and others don’t want anyone to see what they are about to do.
  2. Attempting to entice federal employees to leave and promising them pay through September of this year is not only illegal, it is also a promise they cannot keep because Congress (for now anyway) has to appropriate the funds necessary to pay said employees through the end of September. BUT HE DID IT ANYWAY.
  3. The chaos is the point. And Elon Musk in particular does not want the government having any oversight of his myriad lucrative government contracts. Musk has $20B in government contracts and he just fired the people overseeing them. He and his oligarchical brothers are moving to roll back regulations designed to protect the American public and to ensure our economy isn’t thrown into chaos. Essentially, the fox is now in charge of the hen house.

Then there are the upcoming tariffs–25% across the board against Canada and Mexico, and 10% against China. Someone asked me yesterday, “Why only 10% against China?” The most obvious answer is that Elon Musk has substantial business interests in China, as do large tech companies like Apple. We have to be careful about ensuring our new oligarchs are happy. As for tariffs against Canada and Mexico, they are in fact in direct contravention to the USMCA–the updated NAFTA treaty that Trump renegotiated in his first term in office with Canada and Mexico. Canada and Mexico have already announced retaliatory tariffs against the U.S. As a result, we are going to see increased costs on fruits and vegetables, and heating gas from Canada which our northern states rely upon, among other things. Canada also announced that they will no longer allow American spirits, wine and beer across their border. They are one of America’s biggest customers in that industry, and that is just one example. In other words, everyday Americans and small to medium businesses are adversely effected. Americans pay twice for Trump’s ignorance and hubris, when they never needed to pay in the first place.

It is unclear what Trump’s endgame is with Canada. We don’t have any beef with them. Doing this to our closest neighbor, ally, and trade partner for no reason whatsoever is incredibly destabilizing. It is folly. And these tariffs are, in point of fact, forced inflation. Lower and middle class Americans will be incredibly adversely effected by them. Tariffs do the opposite of what Candidate Trump promised American voters he would do for them–lower the price of groceries. This is all a prelude to huge tax cuts for the very wealthy in this country when Trump and his fully Republican Congress renew and expand the tax cuts for the wealthy they passed during his first administration that were set to expire this year.

Clearly, the combination of Elon Musk and the “Tech Bros” oligarchy on display behind Trump at his Inaugural Address with the truly Fascist policies being pushed through despite their blatant illegality, point to pivoting the United States toward a Russia-like structure of government. There is some argument over whether this new structure is a fascist oligarchy, or an oligarchical fascism. Either way, Trump and the powers behind him are moving rapidly to dismantle our democratic republic using the very levers of democracy to do it. It takes time to challenge all these things in court, and this blitz of horrible executive orders are flooding the zone to the point that it is unclear whether our legal system can handle them all. Even if everything is eventually adjudicated, at least some pieces of our rights and norms will have been eroded.

The attacks on “DEI” are nakedly racist. Trump’s idea of “meritocracy” is putting utterly unqualified white men like Pete Hegseth in charge of the Department of Defense, or arguing with a straight face that RFK Jr. is qualified to run the Department of Health and Human Services.

Possibly the most disturbing move so far is Elon Musk’s lackeys grabbing the keys to the Department of Treasury’s payment system on Friday. I would have said Musk’s people taking control of the Office of Personnel Management, the staffing agency for the entire federal government was terrible, but that was a precursor. Now Musk’s people also have control of the federal payment system that authorizes and sends out payments of around $6 Trillion/year to cover various pre-determined costs, which include Social Security and Medicare. They also have a “Do Not Pay” list of people who have been black-listed for various reasons. So if Musk’s buds are on that list, he can undo that too.

Now, let’s put a bow on this. Republicans have repeatedly said they want to run the government like a business. Specifically, Trump and Musk have said that in recent days. But, the government is not a business. It does not (or should not) have profit centers. It is a system by the people and for the people for the collective good of the people. Things like defense, healthcare, agriculture, education, energy, transportation–these are things our taxes are supposed to support and be competently administered. However, when a multi-billionaire, or any group of monied people for that matter, says he wants to run the government like a business, that implies he means to profit from it. Anyone remember what Musk did when he took over Twitter? He thinks he can do that to our government and get away with it. We are about to find out if he’s right.

Must claimed he could cut $1 to $2T out of our budget. You can’t do that without cutting Social Security and Medicare–systems we have all paid into our entire working lives with the promise of security and healthcare in our retirement years. Trump also promised to renew and expand tax cuts for the wealthy this year, which would have expired without argument had Democrats had the helm this year. So far no one has wrested control of these systems back from Musk.

Here is my speculation: Musk is going to cut off social security and Medicare payments to pay for tax cuts for the wealthy oligarchy that so recently and without objection took over our government. No, it is not supposed to work that way. Yes, he will be challenged in court. But that will take a lot of time that many people do not have, and as we saw with Trump, even being a convicted felon is no guarantee he will pay a price. Musk is using our democracy against us, and he may well succeed. I hear zero republicans in Congress protesting. And Republicans are in the majority. We cannot stop this without them. We have a super-majority conservative Supreme Court which has spent the last few years dismantling civil liberties, voting rights, women’s rights, and any legal avenue for the average person to challenge everything afoot at present. Musk may have just bought himself a country. You might wish to have a look at this article for more information: https://www.msnbc.com/opinion/msnbc-opinion/musk-doge-treasury-payment-system-rcna190222

One more thing: Anyone who doesn’t think a blow-out between Trump and Musk is coming is mistaken. It is coming. Musk has more money. He has already infiltrated key government agencies unchecked. My money is on Musk.