Sometimes You Get What You Deserve

I hear a lot of people – mostly Democrats but there are some Republicans – complaining that DOGE is not legal, not called for, and is nothing more than Donald Trump’s revenge against those that made his life miserable for the last eight years. If that’s all DOGE is, my answer to those who complain about it is one word. KARMA.

Is it possible that DOGE is revenge? Certainly, and I wouldn’t blame Trump if it was, however I believe it’s a whole lot more than the vengeful actions – justifiable, mind you – of an imperfect man. Of course we’re all imperfect, and I don’t know many folks who would not take revenge on those who treated them the way Trump was treated. I just don’t see DOGE as revenge so much as I see it as something that should have been done long ago if a major portion of the federal government wasn’t in on the take.

DOGE is reporting on government spending – specifically those excesses that don’t make sense when you look at budgets and what the money was actually earmarked for. When compared, the purpose and the final use are often as different as Venus and Mars. I said that a major portion of the government was involved, and if all that was wrong was where money was spent, there is a large portion of federal employees who have nothing to do with spending money. What they do have something to do with is the attitude that bureaucrats know better than citizens on what we need and how to get it to us.

Can anyone defend the Treasury Department’s Internal Revenue Service (IRS) for the way Lois Lerner illegally made applying for non-profit status more difficult for conservative organizations than for liberal organizations? Can anyone defend all the IRS minions who saw what Ms. Lerner was doing and didn’t report it? Of course you can’t, and that’s only one problem.

How about the Department of Justice’s Bureau of Alcohol, Tax, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) bending and sometimes breaking the law or violating people’s Constitutional rights? How about no knock raids when there was no reason, using a known invalid search warrant, and violating your own policies when you conducted the raid? Can you condone that? You can’t if you’re conscious and rational.

The above are actions everyone can see and be upset about. That’s not what DOGE is reporting, although it is a symptom of the same mindset that is being reported on.

There are, or maybe I should say soon to be were, people in the federal government who decide they know better than elected officials, better than the people, and better than the Constitution, and they take money allocated by the congress and use it for things it wasn’t meant for.

Does the congress know? I would have to say yes, and they have the power of oversight of all these government departments, they have the duty to ask questions and demand answers, and the congress, especially the House of Representatives, have the duty and responsibility to control the purse strings.

We’ve all seen how the bureaucrats dodge and bloviate in hearings when asked specific questions about how they do their job and what they spend taxpayer money on. With the non-answers congress receives, I would think that subpoenas and hearings would be the obvious follow-on, however the usual follow-on is to call the same people and ask the same questions again. Then they complain when they get the same answers.

My thought on all of this is the bureaucrats and the congress are all complicit in the game. The bureaucrats misspend the money that the congress allocates – the congress knows exactly where the money is actually going – and then the game of ask and not answer is played for public consumption.

I find it impossible to believe that all 535 members of the House of Representatives and the Senate are not aware of the details of the scam. Add the several million federal employees who know where the money goes even if they don’t know why it goes there, and the congress not knowing is impossible.

Are there some in congress who know and have tried and are trying to solve the problem. Certainly, but they get nowhere because the rest of the club are on the take.

And if you think “on the take” is too strong, ask yourself how, on a salary of $174,000/year congressional freshmen are dirt poor and are worth millions after a term or two. The same goes for Senators, none of whose fortune is lacking after one or two terms. Somebody is getting kickbacks, or donations to their PAC, or a member of their family gets a high paying no-show job.

So DOGE is karma. Hopefully the misspent fortune of the American taxpayer will be reported on, the miscreants who pushed these schemes will be identified, and if the DOJ does their job based on investigations by the FBI, assuming they do their job, some of these vermin will get an all expenses paid vacation at Club Fed.

If karma is working especially well, some congresspeople and federal judges may join the bureaucrats for their vacation. Knowingly misappropriating funds is a crime. There’s a lot of blame to pass around.

Lord knows it’s about time this happened!

And I will be entertained.

Jack Sotallaro

Continuity planning, civilian and military