The Daily Populous Saturday May 3rd, 2025 night edition
Authored by newrepublic.com and submitted by Quirkie

As Musk steps back from DOGE, we’re getting a number of assessments of his “accomplishments.” They’re generally harsh. He vowed to slash $2 trillion in “wasteful” federal spending (the federal government spends just under $7 trillion a year). He recently acknowledged it’ll be more like $150 billion. However, his “cuts” will also cost American taxpayers $135 billion, according to one estimate, because it turns out that some of these bloodsucking deep staters save taxpayers money. But even $150 billion is a grotesque lie. Jessica Reidl of the Manhattan Institute—yes, the staunchly conservative and generally pro-Trump think tank—recently told The New York Times’ David French: “So right now I would say DOGE has saved $2 billion, which, to put it in context, is one-thirty-fifth of 1 percent of the federal budget, otherwise known as budget dust.”

That’s harsh, all right. But it’s not only or even mainly on fiscal grounds that he deserves our contempt. The cuts are leaving thousands of good people unemployed. And they will literally kill people. Coal miners will die prematurely. Children all over the world will die from malaria and other diseases because of the demise of USAID, which Musk called a “criminal organization.” In fact, this is already happening: Children with AIDS in Africa have died because of the elimination of a President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR, outreach program. That’s just the beginning of the enormous pain these cuts will inflict across the world. And the richest man on the planet, who grew up amid vast wealth from his father’s emerald-mining operations and has never known hardship or had to rely on a government service in his life (unless you count $38 billion in government contracts, loans, subsidies, and tax credits for his companies), is responsible for every drop of it.

Thursday night, MSNBC’s Stephanie Ruhle and Jacob Soboroff hosted a fantastic special from Washington, in which they gathered some 50 federal workers from around the country to talk about what they did, why they loved their jobs, and how this will hurt people. One person, Scott Laney, was a Morgantown-based epidemiologist who spoke eloquently about the dedication of the people he worked with. Keri Murphy of the Commerce Department was working to implement the CHIPS and Science Act—that is, bringing jobs back to America in just the way Donald Trump says he wants. “That’s why I thought I was safe,” Murphy told Soboroff. Tamara Maze of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said: “All federal workers I’ve ever known are in it because we want to serve the country.”

pomonamike on May 2nd, 2025 at 16:40 UTC »

Yeah and just yesterday a gaggle of teenage boys tried to convince me that he is the smartest person in the world simply because he is rich. They literally believe he designs and builds rockets and electric cars himself. One of their mothers is literally an engineer for SpaceX but her kid believes Musk is the one that actually does the work.

I don’t get it.

sachiprecious on May 2nd, 2025 at 16:23 UTC »

People have already died.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2025/03/15/opinion/foreign-aid-cuts-impact.html?unlocked_article_code=1.4E4.ppHF.qLql6sPv8VVi&smid=re-nytopinion

https://www.currentaffairs.org/news/starving-the-worlds-poor-is-one-of-trumps-most-reprehensible-acts

This really needs much bigger news coverage.

EDIT: Forgot this one. https://pepfar.impactcounter.com/

reddittorbrigade on May 2nd, 2025 at 16:20 UTC »

Elon Musk is a Nazi who has no conscience, empathy and respect for human beings.

He is worse than a criminal.