Looks Like Trump Learned Something From His First Term — Control the Money, Gut the Bureaucracy

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Larry C. Johnson
sonar21

Looks Like Trump Learned Something From His First Term — Control the Money, Gut the Bureaucracy • Dateline: 6 February 2025 by Larry C. Johnson  

Smirking Trump: “Top of the world, Ma!”  We’ll see what happens as history moves on.

Let me start by noting that Trump’s callous, alarming plan to launch another Nakba in Palestine is not much of a plan. Trump added some caveats today, which make it highly unlikely that the Gazans will be forced from their homeland any time soon. First, the relocation will only be possible after the fighting ends. Second, the US will not pay for this. Third, there will be no US boots on the ground. In other words, Trump was spinning an idea that has no actual plan for implementation. While Zionists are celebrating Trump’s proposal, their euphoria is nothing more than a sugar high. The Gazans are safe, for now at least.

In light of the Zionists’ failure to defeat Hamas after 16 months of combat, the odds of a new Nakba happening any time soon is unlikely given Trump’s benchmark that the fighting must be over. Another limiting factor: Before Trump can try to remove the Palestinians from Gaza, the Palestinians would need somewhere to go. All of the likely candidates — i.e., Egypt and Jordan — have said, “hell no!” Even if some country (or countries) agree to provide sanctuary to the Palestinians, it would take months to construct the housing and infrastructure to host more than a million men, women and children. In short, other events in the region, such as an agreement with Iran, will determine the fate of the Palestinians.

[su_note note_color=”#e9ebed” text_color=”#0c0a0a” radius=”6″]Editor’s Note: Much as I appreciate and admire Larry’s work, his powerful and sober intellect, and his exemplary moral integrity, sometimes, on some aspects, we may hold different opinions. In this case, I am not so sure we can equate “the Deep State” with the Federal government bureaucracy. Sure, all the major agencies of the Feds are implementers and tools of the Deep State—the Pentagon, the CIA, the FBI, and a dense jungle (or salad) of other letter agencies—but powerful as these bodies are, they are still being directed by a deeper layer of US and global society, chiefly the global oligarchy, whose main citadel is currently anchored in Washington DC. So you can shrink this visible “government” all you like, and not diminish one iota the power (or direction) of the global super-rich’s agenda, who are really nothing more or less than the collective embodiment of monopoly capitalism, imperialism.  Incidentally, the ostentatious dismantlement of USAID (an agency typically misnamed at birth to suggest “aid” when in reality it was meant, like the NED, to serve a diametrically opposite purpose) is just cynical showmanship. With the mask falling off (or taking it off, as now may be unneeded), due to the enormous damage to US “soft power” as a result of its blatant participation in the Palestinian genocide, the cynical Ukrainian proxy war, (whose narrative has also been high-handedly manipulated to this day, but which, laboriously and cumulatively, independent journalists and commentators have finally challenged and significantly dented, causing mainstream media unraveling), the Empire is moving to hide its criminal deeds, to “bury the bodies” so to speak, becoming more opaque on who does what in its regime change ops around the world. These, of course, will continue until the Empire is no more. You can bank on that.  For further ref on this subject, see Rainer Shea’s The false narrative that Trump has ended regime change ops, & the covert nature of the empire’s next actions . Lastly, I am not a subscriber to the simplistic notion, so dear to right-wingers (and endlessly promoted by the billionaires and their mouthpieces in the media and political class), that government “size”, per se, is an evil. Government is just a human tool, indispensable in a class-divided society. Compared to prior administrations of a more “normal”, conservative character, the FDR state apparatus was big, almost revolutionary, for its time, no doubt about that. But would the US had stood a chance of recovering from the Great Depression without his massive Keynesian footprint, later reinforced by the more malignant (and permanent) addition of Pentagon Keynesianism?  The question is, therefore, which class does the government serve? And how well? THAT is the real question. That’s what the debate should be about. —PG [/su_note][su_divider style=”dotted” divider_color=”#153e75″ size=”7″ margin=”20″]

The real news is what Trump is doing to the financial foundation of the Deep State. He is shredding it, and the entrenched bureaucrats are in a panic. I am posting a recent Tucker Carlson interview with the newly approved Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), Mr. Russ Vought. If you want to understand what Trump is going to do to the engorged agencies, watch the video posted below. Vought served as OMB director in Trump’s first term. He learned what not to do and what he should have done. He is a veteran of bureaucratic warfare. He suffered some failures during his first time in office. This time is going to be different.

Here are some of the latest moves by Trump to rein in the government behemoth:

• The White House has directed the General Services Administration to terminate “every single media contract” expensed by the agency, according to an email obtained by Axios.
• What they’re saying: “GSA team, please do two things,” a Trump administration official wrote:
• Pull all contracts for Politico, BBC, E&E (Politico sub) and Bloomberg
• Pull all media contracts for just GSA – cancel every single media contract today for GSA only.
• Why it matters: PresidentTrump is targeting the Federal government’s media contracts after Elon Musk and his allies discovered millions of dollars in agency subscriptions to Politico Pro, a policy tracking service widely used in Washington.

USAID is on the ropes in the aftermath of Elon Musk’s discoveries:

Ditto for the Environmental Protection Agency. Reuters reports:

The Trump administration has placed on leave nearly 200 employees who work on environmental justice programs at the Environmental Protection Agency, and is pursuing staff reductions in similar programs at the Justice Department.

The moves are in line with President Donald Trump’s broader orders to remove U.S. government support for diversity, equity and inclusion practices within the federal government, as well as to weaken Biden-era climate regulation.

Then there is Trump’s broader offer for US government employees to take early retirement and accept a buyout. Even the CIA is in play:

The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) has extended voluntary resignation buyouts to its entire workforce in a bold move to streamline federal operations and align with President Trump’s vision of reducing government waste.

The offer, which includes approximately eight months of pay and benefits, is part of a broader effort to reshape the agency and ensure it aligns with the administration’s national security priorities. The decision, announced this week, mirrors similar buyout packages offered to millions of federal employees as the Trump administration seeks to downsize and modernize the federal government.

So far, more than 60,000 US government employees have agreed to take the deal, although a Federal judge has moved the cutoff date from February 6 to February 10, pending a court hearing on Monday. No President in my memory has done what Trump is doing — actually reducing the number of Federal government employees. Ronald Reagan made bold promises to downsize the Federal government, but he did nothing to deliver on that promise. He did the opposite. The US government work force grew by almost 100,000 during Reagan’s two terms.

Which brings me back to Russ Vought. As the new Director of OMB, he takes office with a clear mandate from Trump and a plan to downsize the Federal government and extirpate Democrat activists (sic) from key leadership positions. This is a lengthy discussion, but it is worth your time:

Tucker Carlson
Nov 18, 2024 The Tucker Carlson Show
Russ Vought ran OMB under Trump the first time, and hopefully will again. Here’s what he learned about how the deep state actually works. Follow Tucker on X: https://x.com/TuckerCarlson

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