Tuesday, May 10, 2022

Larry Correia's recipe to fix government

 

As regular readers will know, bestselling author Larry Correia and I (and mutual friends Lawdog, Old NFO and others) have known each other for decades.  Lawdog's and my reviews of Larry's first book, "Monster Hunter International", were quoted on the back cover of the first edition of that book, to our amusement and gratification.  You might even find certain vague resemblances between one of the book's minor characters and yours truly.

Larry is anything but politically correct, and is somewhat . . . emphatic . . . in his opinions.  (It's one of the reasons we love the big lug!)  He recently wrote a long thread on Twitter about how to fix our current political problems.  Having given a few thoughts about that in my first post this morning, I thought you might enjoy Larry's perspective.  The outline below is taken from Threadreader, which does a good job of combining the original tweets into a cohesive whole.

(Note that Larry is equally scathing about both major political parties.  He's right.  They're both part of the problem.)


1 There's a red wave coming because normal voters are fed up with democrat bullshit. They suck at governing and they cater to their base, which is psychotic.

But the GOP has a history of being lame, cowardly, corrupt squishes, so our government keeps sucking.

How do we fix it? 

2 this is my opinion, based upon working as an accountant/contractor for the most efficient part of our stupid government, which was still a ****ing clown show when compared to the corporate world (or at least the non-woke corporate world) 

3 A well known, yet denied, truth is that most government employees are entrenched and don't do ****. They're utterly useless.

Depending on the department you could fire a ton of them and all it would do is free up parking spaces. 

4 Now, there are some government employees who work their asses off. Good. There are some government functions which are necessary. Great.

A great many don't work, or the work they do is utterly pointless. 

5 As any honest gov employee. They will admit this to you in private.

If they say no, everything we do is vital and everyone here is vital, they're a liar protecting their budget, or one of the useless ones.

Most places, if there are 5 employees, 2 do 90% of the work. 

6 Pournelle's Iron Law says that as it grows over time any bureaucracy's purpose will change from its original mission, to a new mission of protecting and growing the bureaucracy. 

7 so now our Department of Labor by itself is bigger than LBJ's entire federal government. This stuff never shrinks. It only grows. It's an endless leviathan. 

8 the leviathan needs to grow and protect itself against all threats, which is how you get super evil **** like the CIA and FBI meddling in US elections...

Or constantly expanding its powers into new places, like the #MinistryOfTruth 

9 This leviathan will find allies which help it expand in size and power. The more power/money you give it, the more it can bribe and co-opt other institutions. Academia, media, corporations, etc.

Whichever political philosophy is the most unprincipled will rock this arrangement 

10 as the leviathan grows in power, it will become more malicious, spiteful, and controlling. Dissent is crushed. Freedom dies.

@elonmusk is currently a speed bump in this, which is why the control freak contingent is super pissed at him. 

11 the big question is, do the people own their government, or does the government own its people? If we are just assets of the gov, we can be spent freely, and bad assets get eliminated.

The leviathan is compelled to own EVERYTHING. 

12 slowing the leviathan down isn't enough. If you concentrate on stopping one part, others keep growing. Then when our bipolar country elects a new leader, those parts start growing again. Repeat forever. And it just keeps getting bigger.

So we've got to shrink the whole thing 

13 if the GOP had a brain/spine (lol) they'd slash the **** out of everything. They'd starve the beast. They usually don't, because they are total chicken****s. They'll pay lip service to this, do nothing, or feed their favorite parts.

The DNC gleefully feeds the whole thing. 

14 Trump's biggest weakness was he surrounded himself with people who loved government, and loved expanding government. Of course all of those ****ed him at every opportunity.

We need somebody who actively HATES the government to run it. 

15 if I was President (ha!) I would only create a single new executive branch entity. The Department of **** Your Job Security. 

16 the DoFYJS would consist of surly auditors, and their only job would be to go into other government agencies to figure out-

A. do you ****ers do anything worth a shit?

B. which of you ****ers actually get shit done?

Then fire everyone else. 

17 right now it is pretty much impossible to fire government employees. The process is asinine.

It is so bad that the worst government employees, who nobody else can stand, don't get fired. They get PROMOTED.

Its easier, and then its somebody else's problem. 

18 but the DoFYJS don't care. If your job is making tax payers fill out mandatory paperwork and then filing it somewhere nobody will ever read it?

**** you. Gone. Clean out your desk. 

19 we need to get rid of entire agencies. Gone. WTF does the Department of Education improve? NOTHING.

Gone. Fire them all. Sell the assets. 

20 any agency that survives this purge, move it out of DC to an area more appropriate to its mission. Do we need a Dept of Agriculture? Okay. Go to Kansas.

This will also cause all the DC/NOVA power monger set to resign so I don't have to waste time firing them. 

21 oh, and right wing pet causes, you're not safe. I worked for the Air Force. We all know that we could fire 1/3 of the GS employees tomorrow and the only noticeable difference would be more parking available on base. 

22 Cut everything. We never do, because somebody might cry. Too bad. They're called budget cuts because they're supposed to hurt. Not budget tickles. **** you. Cut.

Shutting off the money faucet will also destroy the unholy alliance between gov/media/academia/tech. 

23 right now there is a revolving door, government job, university job, corporate board, think tank, the same crowd who goes to the same parties and went to the same schools and all that other incestuous **** just take turns in the different chairs.

Sell the ****ing chairs. 

24 every entity that gets tax money inevitably turns into a pig trough for these people. Cut it all off. All of these money faucets ALWAYS cause some kind of financial crisis later anyway. 

25 see the student loan crisis caused by the government, here is free money, oh college has become expensive and useless, so now we need more government to solve it. You dummies get to pay for it. Have some inflation.

It's all bullshit.

Quit pretending any of this makes sense. 

26 The only way the leviathan shrinks is we elect people who actively hate the government to the government, and then only let them stay there long enough to **** the government without getting corrupted by it. 

27 the instant you see the small government crusader you sent to DC going "Oh, well maybe an unholy alliance between the state and OmniGlobalMegaCorp to develop a mind control ray is a good thing" FIRE HIM. 

28 So there you have it. That's my platform if you elect me president. Fire ****ing everybody. And only give me one term. Thank you.

Oh wait... why did I just get these hot insider stock trading tips in my inbox from Blackrock? I guess a second term is cool. 

29 seriously though, something has to break. We can't afford the loss of money or more importantly, freedom. The government either has to start cutting off parasites and control freaks, or stuff is going to get way way worse.

-end 


I can't argue with a single word.  And you, readers?

Peter


22 comments:

1chota said...

Larry understated the problem with Republicans: they are not just cowardly, but are indeed corrupt cowards.
Thus no change.

Ritchie said...

#20-North Dakota

Jim said...

I'd vote for him.

Jeff McPhate said...

This all really got out of hand with the war powers assumed by Lincoln in the Civil War, and again when Wilson fabricated the Federal Reserve and got us into WWI by loaning money to UK and France, and it has been going downhill with "special, emergency, we'll give these powers back pinky swear" ever since. Larry is right, but there is no way to peacefully do it. Too many pigs at the trough, from top to bottom. Too many communists, too many grifters, too many on the dole. Besides, the voting process is totally corrupt. The "2000 Mules" movie proved it, but where's the outrage? Where's the RICO charges? Republicans should be leading that charge but all I hear are crickets.

TheOtherSean said...

On point #20, I have some specific relocation suggestions:

Department of Agriculture: Salina, Kansas
Department of Commerce: Wilmington, Delaware
Department of Defense: Huntsville, Alabama
Department of Education: Kodiak, Alaska
Department of Energy: Houston, Texas or Oak Ridge, Tennessee
Department of Health and Human Services: Jackson, Mississippi
Department of Homeland Security: Attu, Alaska
Department of Housing and Urban Development: Camden, New Jersey
Department of the Interior: Interior, South Dakota
Department of Justice: Adak, Alaska
Department of Labor: Kennewick, Washington
Department of State: Waterloo, Iowa
Department of Transportation: Vandalia, Ohio (in view of intersection of I-70 and I-75)
Department of Treasury: Columbia, Missouri
Department of Veterans Affairs: Scranton, Pennsylvania

Amahl_Shukup said...

We ride at dawn. Let's do this.

T Town said...

The leviathan has grown too big to starve it into something smaller. The only way to get it to a more manageable size is to destroy it, and then rebuild it with limits built in, like term limits for the elected, no job protection or unions for gov employees, and limits on the number and size of gov departments. This not only applies to the fed, but to the states and a lot of local gov as well.

Rob said...

The Uniparty & it's allies won't allow it.

Sam said...

Epiphanies from Nassim Nicholas Taleb
The "Black Swan" theorist reflects on the most stable country in human history and the folly of the European Union.

https://foreignpolicy.com/2012/10/08/epiphanies-from-nassim-nicholas-taleb/

MNW said...

Lincoln war powers

Wilson too much to list

FDR too much to list

MNW said...

You are too kind. I would put HUD in Detroit or some other rust belt ghost town.


Homeland needs to be broken up and shrunk down

Aesop said...

Change "fire" to "kill", and it's got a bare chance of working.

And I don't mean quietly, in a back alley, on their way home from dinner.

I mean publicly, by guillotine, in Lafayette Park.
The new president has 7 days to draw up a list.
on Day Eight, the total number, divided by 358, is how many people will be executed in Lafayette Park that day. Allow five minutes apiece, and a 10% fudge factor for mechanical difficulties and pee breaks, and then ensure you have that many guillotines ready for duty each day, and spend the rest of Year One doing it.

You won't need a Year Two plan, because for every one you behead, two more will voluntarily seek greener pastures.

And every congresscritter gets one receptionist, and one assistant. The Senate Majority Leader and House Speaker can have one extra assistant. Period.

All legislation and federal code will be deabted and voted on by Congress. Anything not so enacted sunsets on the last day of the year in which it was written into law.

Sessions of Congress are limited to one month in January, without heating, and one month in July, without air conditioning. If it was good enough to two future presidents in Philadelphia in 1776, it's good enough for the current crop of @$$clowns in DC.

Anyone who choses to leave ahead of the guillotine would be permitted to sign on at either minimum wage, picking up trash at national parks and monuments, until they hit retirement; or to enlist in the military as private soldiers, at the base pay rate, and remain in service under all current regulations (including physical fitness) until reaching that retirement, at which point they could draw a pension based on their last salary and type of service.

Otherwise, two week's pay severance (pardon the pun) to their next of kin, and a fine brass urn for their cremated ashes.

"Thank you for your service."

Sam said...

"We need smaller, more decentralized government. On paper, it might appear much more efficient to be large — to have economies of scale. But in reality, it’s much more efficient to be small. An elephant is vastly more efficient, metabolically, than a mouse. It’s the same for a megacity as opposed to a village. But an elephant can break a leg very easily, whereas you can toss a mouse out of a window and it’ll be fine. Size makes you fragile." Nassim Nicholas Taleb

I think that "The Black Swan" and "Antifragile" both by Taleb are must reads for any one interested in breaking the Left/Right Paradigm.

https://foreignpolicy.com/2012/10/08/epiphanies-from-nassim-nicholas-taleb/

The Freeholder said...

Replying to TheOtherSam, we're not moving the departments, we're closing most of them them.

Department of Agriculture: Salina, Kansas
Department of Commerce: CLOSED
Department of Defense: Huntsville, Alabama
Department of Education: CLOSED
Department of Energy: CLOSED
Department of Health and Human Services: CLOSED
Department of Homeland Security: CLOSED
Department of Housing and Urban Development: CLOSED

Department of the Interior: Interior, South Dakota
Department of Justice: Adak, Alaska
Department of Labor: CLOSED
Department of State: Waterloo, Iowa
Department of Transportation: CLOSED
Department of Treasury: Columbia, Missouri
Department of Veterans Affairs: Scranton, Pennsylvania

And I could make good arguments for closing Interior and maybe Veterans' Affairs.

Think of the government as kudzu or perhaps wisteria. Seemed like a good idea until we let grow out of control. Time to rip it out by the roots.

Me said...

There is no red wave coming. There was a red tsunami last time and they stole it. Having committed that coup they can never back down.

Unclezip Is Pointing&Laughing said...

My late friend John One Horse, Lakota Suix, had a simple plan for nearly all of our government-inflicted ills: " just shoot 'em".

KevinM said...

Well he's on to something but the NWO says "you will own nothing and be happy".He better hurry with his program with FBiden trying to get us under control of the WHO later this month May22-28 when it comes to health issues...........?

Paul said...

Dunno. Just got a notice from the county my taxes where late. The mentioned they would seize my house. Kick me out and sell it for the outstanding tax liability. I would send the a letter explaining my concern with a group that threatens before the even ask. But they would most likely raise my taxes to the moon.

Does piss me offa bit though. If one of my employees had done that I would tearfully let them go. What ever happened to basic courtesy.

Lampposts are looking a little bare.

MNW said...

I would keep the DOE and DOT, but make them more focused and slimmed down.

Will said...

MNW:

have those two departments done ANYTHING useful since being established? Especially the DOE. The DOT may have done some good by establishing standards for vehicles. MAYBE. Not entirely sure it was good in the long run.

Scrivener said...

A proposal for Constitutional amendment:

No one may serve more than five terms, or portions thereof, in elected office in the United States, no more than two terms in the same office, such service to be lifetime prohibition on receiving remuneration, of any type or amount, from a government in the United States beyond salary for service in an elected office, with lifetime requirement of all copies of personal and business tax filing submissions to be published publicly; no one may be employed in a civilian capacity by, or receive remuneration of any type or amount, from a government in the United States for a period greater than 15 years, such prohibition to include civilian post-employment remuneration of any type or amount, with the sole exception of salary, benefits and retirement commensurate with rank in sworn service in the five military branches of the United States.

This does create a loophole for "we're not hiring more people, we're engaging contractors" however, so budget limits for whatever few agencies we actually need must be small, very simple and very public. There is advantage to having all the rats in one place where they can be monitored, but we've seen how that doesn't work; probably better to have much fewer rats out in Flyover Country where their customers are.

There may be a simpler way to prevent the creation of a 'Professional Politican Government Employee Class", if so, let's hear it.

Mad Jack said...

Allow me to preface this by saying that these are my own personal opinions, and that I've read Larry Correia enough to conclude that he's somewhat of a pompous ass with enough hubris for at least one Democrat President, perhaps two. That doesn't prevent him from being right about most of his opinions.

Correia proposes an efficiency evaluation group, which he aptly names The Department of Removing [STET - MJ] Your Job Security. Very good. He continues to say that -

16 the DoFYJS would consist of surly auditors, and their only job would be to go into other government agencies to figure out-

A. do you ****ers do anything worth a shit?

Having been forwarned of the arrival, everyone has an answer ready
except those few who actually work for a living. They're busy working, trying to meet some deadline or other, and have decided that any response is going to be the wrong one. They've already got an updated résumé and a list of probable new employers.

B. which of you ****ers actually get shit done?
Those that answer - don't. I've actually seen this in practice.

Then fire everyone else.
Right. That's a noble goal, but -

17 right now it is pretty much impossible to fire government employees. The process is asinine.

The process is beyond asinine.

A good friend of mine worked in upper management for the government, and one fine day he got a new employee that he didn't hire. She was a transfer from someplace else.

The woman was black, legally deaf, and played the race card at every opportunity. Now my friend, her immediate supervisor, keeps copious notes and pays attention to detail. He made special training on computer systems available to her (she failed; she was both bad tempered and stupid) and followed procedure as dictated by the Personnel Department. At the end of six months, he fired her.

A week later the Director of Personnel and a brace of lawyers stop by his office. The Director whines - she was a minority, female, and
differently abled. Why did you have to get rid of her?

My friend explains that she did no useful work.

The Director throws up her hands and legal wakes up. Is there any chance that you have any paperwork at all documenting this case.

As a matter of fact... my friend drops an inch thick stack of paper on the desk. Legal snatches it up and starts reading... they smile. The more they read, the happier they get. This is a slam dunk. We are going to take this f***ing low life apart!

And they did that.

The rest of the black staff started coming in early, leaving late, and trying their best to work for a living.

When my friend retired his blood pressure returned to normal and he lost 30 pounds without working at it. Huh.

Shrinking the government (Federal, State, or Local) is a great idea, but it's not likely to happen in my lifetime.