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Comment by kelnos | Hacker News Reader

(Can't read the article due to paywall and no working mirror on archive.is right now.)

I mean... duh? This shouldn't be news to anyone paying attention. DOGE was shock-and-awe theater, and a means to shake up agencies and gain access to sensitive information. At best, they saved a few tens of millions of dollars, which at that level isn't really worth the effort.

The GOP always cries about spending and the deficit, but when they're in charge, they spend just as much as Democrats (if not more!), and, to make things worse, cut taxes (usually for the rich more than anyone else). The largest part of the federal budget isn't the discretionary spending, anyway.

And the effects of the tariffs have been obvious to anyone not drinking the MAGA Kool-Aid.

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As long as I’ve been alive, the biggest deficit hawks (read: Republicans) are the biggest spenders when it’s their turn on power.

They keep cutting taxes, too. That's a big part of the problem.

A space alien newly arrived on Earth and looking at just actions taken, GAO/CBO reports, and the actual historical data, would conclude that, at least since 1980, Democrats were the ones who cared (a lot) more about the budget deficit than Republicans. The notion that voting for Republicans is the best move for a voter whose major issue is the deficit, is just marketing.

There was a time, probably before Reagan came to office, that the cutting/reforming taxes yielded positive returns. But fifty years on, the high-hanging fruit has all been picked. This is widely acknowledged by "true conservatives" (takes one to know one).

Everything goes to the debt, the only way out is through cuts to entitlements or broadly raising taxes, both deeply unpopular.

> The GOP always cries about spending and the deficit, but when they're in charge, they spend just as much as Democrats (if not more!), and, to make things worse, cut taxes (usually for the rich more than anyone else). The largest part of the federal budget isn't the discretionary spending, anyway.

IMHO, the GOP wants to reduce government spending for ideological reasons, but doesn't generally have any particular thing it wants to reduce spending on, and certainly doesn't want to take the blame for cutting any particular programs. So they do a tax cut, because voters like tax cuts; and chances are Democrats will be in power when the deficit / debt gets big enough that it needs to be addressed. Then Democrats will have to do the poor PR business of raising taxes or making specific cuts. If Democrats make specific cuts to reduce government spending in order to make the lower taxes work, the GOP furthered their ideology and got good vibes for lowering taxes, while the Democrats got bad vibes for cutting programs.

I don't like it, but it works for the GOP, so I'm sure we'll see it continue.

Anything DOGE "saved" was quickly burned by punching cities in the nose, trying to get a rise out of them.

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