The Department of Government Efficiency is surely an oxymoron. There is no efficiency in government anywhere. President-elect Trump has appointed Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy to head up this new department. He could not have made a better choice.
Those of you who regularly read my column know that I am no fan of government. I think local government is just slightly better than the state, and state government is a little better than the federal. Government is inefficient and wasteful in every segment. But it blows the mind to take a deep dive and look at the waste, fraud and abuse that happens within our federal government.
Democrats and Republicans alike continuously vote to ignore the debt ceiling that they themselves put into place. Does it make any sense to even have a debt limit if you are simply going to ignore it? I have never been able to understand that.
The American taxpayers work until April 23 to pay their share of the federal tax bill. That is considered Tax Freedom Day. For the remainder of the year, we are allowed to work to support our family. Imagine that! More than a third of the year, we work to support this disastrous list of waste.
Sen. Rand Paul from Kentucky provides a list every year of some of the wasteful spends. He calls it a “Festivus” Report. I have included some of this list. This is by no means a comprehensive list. Books could be filled with thousands more items that our Congress has approved.
Festivus Report 2023
• Barbie Doll Photo Used to Get COVID PPP Funds: portion of $800 billion
• In the RED: Interest on Our National Debt is Expensive: $659 billion
• Dr. Fauci’s Monkey Business on NIH’s “Monkey Island”: $33.2 million
• USAID Fund to Boost Egyptian Tourism: $6 million
• USDA’s Cutting-Edge Research: Walking Dogs in the Summer: Unknown
• DHS Training Employees to Be Their “Authentic & Best Selves”: Unknown
• Russian Cats-On-A-Treadmill Studies Funded by NIH: portion of $2.7 million
• The Government Pays Dead People … Again!: $38 million
• DOD’s Lobster Tank: $8,395
• How to Ruin Expensive Military Equipment Part 1: Engines: $89 million
• How to Ruin Expensive Military Equipment Part 2: Transmissions: $12.6 million
• How to Ruin Expensive Military Equipment Part 3: Tank Treads: $68 million
• “Real Fake”: DHS’s 1st Graphic Novel About Disinformation: Unknown
• DHS’s 2nd Graphic Novel: COVID Disinformation: Unknown
• NIH’s Meth-Head Monkeys: portion of $12 million
• Treasury’s Pot of Cash for Political Campaigns: $400 million
• NIH’s Monkey Casino: Gambling for Drinking Water: portion of $3.7 million
• SBA’s Ticket to Backstage: $200 million
• Studying COVID-19 “Misinformation” On Social Media In Black & Rural Communities: $3.8 million
• Dr. Fauci’s Transgender Monkey Study: $477,121
• Whoopsie: Improper Federal Payments: $236 billion
I tried to decide which of these items might be my favorite, but it was too difficult. I find it extremely shocking that our interest payments alone are $659 billion. That’s an increase of $184 billion over 2022. We don’t have the money to pay the interest on this debt, so we borrow it, much of it from China. We are borrowing money to pay interest on money that we had to borrow in the first place. What’s the definition of insanity? Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. This train must stop somewhere.
One interesting item is $33.2 million on Dr. Fauci’s “Monkey Island.” This is the same “monkey farm” in South Carolina from where 43 monkeys recently escaped. That sounds like a lot of “monkey business.”
The Department of Defense spends money on a lobster tank? I wonder if that is used to house lobsters for their culinary pleasure? Just asking.
Why on earth are we spending money on Egyptian tourism? That’s just a drop in the bucket. So far, we have spent more than $100 million on tourism for Egypt. Tourism is a wonderful thing, but American taxpayers should not be footing the bill to encourage tourism for other countries. Don’t we have our own tourism industry here in the United States?
You get the picture. This shouldn’t be too hard to cut these ridiculous expenditures. But just wait. You won’t believe the firestorm when these guys pull out the ax.
Sen. Joyce Krawiec has represented Forsyth County and the 31st District in the North Carolina Senate since 2014. She lives in Kernersville.
