Warrior Ethos

Recent travel to visit with family found us in Mobile Alabama for a week with an opportunity to become temporary Mobilians and soak-up the history, food and ambiance of this coastal city.  A boat ride of the delta estuary provided an opportunity to take-in the waterfront, port facilities and Austal Shipyard up-close and personal; including these vessels in the shipyard for routine scheduled maintenance.

The USNS Medgar Evers (T-AKE-13) is a Lewis and Clark-class dry cargo and ammunition ship of the United States Navy.

USNS Medgar Evers

USNS ships, also known as United States Naval Ships, are owned by the U.S. Navy.  However, they are operated by the Military Sealift Command (MSC) with civilian crews. While these ships are civilian-manned, some may also have a small military complement for specific functions

Several US Navy vessels have been named after civil rights activists, and some of these names are currently under review for potential renaming. Ships like the USNS Harvey Milk, USNS John Lewis, USNS Thurgood Marshall, USNS Ruth Bader Ginsburg, USNS Medgar Evers and USNS Harriet Tubman are among those being considered for name changes. 

The John Lewis-class of oilers are designed to refuel and resupply other Navy ships at sea and are specifically named after prominent civil rights leaders.  The proposed name changes are part of efforts by the Trump Administration to expunge what they believe are prior diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives within the military.  

USNS Harvey Milk (T-AO-206) is the second of the John Lewis-class of underway replenishment oilers, operated by the Military Sealift Command.

USNS Harvey Milk

The potential renaming of these ships has sparked controversy; some of these assets have been deployed for five to fifteen years with sailors and members of the public viewing this as a symbolic erasure of the contributions of these individuals to American history and civil rights. 

Moreover, renaming a ship can be fraught. In naval tradition this practice is widely considered bad luck.  This stems from the belief that a ship has an identity and spirit, which renaming can anger or confuse. This superstition is rooted in ancient Greek mythology, where Poseidon, the god of the sea, was thought to keep a record of all ship names in his "Ledger of the Deep". Changing a ship's name was seen as disrespecting the sea gods and risking their wrath and incurring possible misfortune at sea. 

In further back-and-forth developments Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth insisted just this past Wednesday that military veterans and active-duty troops urged the Trump administration to rename American military bases after Confederate traitors who took up arms against the government to defend the enslavement of Black people — a move the secretary claims is “important for morale.”

In his testimony to the Senate Armed Services committee, Hegseth defended the president’s decision to restore the names of several military bases in the South that were first named in honor of Confederate generals, despite Congress mandating their removal five years ago. 

Time will tell where this all ends-up.  Seems the MAGA movement itself has embraced its own version of Political Correctness and Woke.  

Drama, reality television theatrics and a waste of resources.  Jeesus; anybody else been to this rodeo before?

Still waiting for measurable improvement in your and my prosperity and general lot in life.  And maybe make the world a safer place.  Good thing I am a patient sort.....

Pretty Boy

 

 

As DOGE strips the rest of the federal government for parts, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth is putting his money where his mouth is (literally) ordering the construction of a makeup studio in the Pentagon for remote television interviews.

Hegseth has yet to hold a press conference in the Defense Department briefing room, but he has used it to film appearances on Fox News.

Our war fighting capability — and apparently eye shadow — spending is safe from Trump’s cost-cutting agenda: He and Hegseth just proposed the country’s first-ever $1 trillion annual defense budget.

Read the entire story here.  

Theater At The DOGE

I asked ChatGPT: 

How much budget savings so far from Musk's Department of Government Efficiency?

As of March 2, 2025, the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), let by Elon Musk, reported the cancellation of 128 contracts recently, resulting in approximately $60 million in savings.  Since Its inception, DOGE reports terminating over 3,000 wasteful contracts.

However, analyses by external organizations have raised questions about these reported savings.  An NPR investigation found discrepancies in DOGE's claimed savings, suggesting potential overstatements. 

Additionally, data from DOGE's "Wall of Receipts" indicates that nearly 40% of the cancelled contracts are expected to yield no actual savings. 

In specific instances, DOGE identified inefficiencies in software licensing.  For example, the General Services Administration (GSA) reportedly held 37,000 WinZip licenses for 13,000 employees, leading to a claimed $9.6 million in savings after addressing the surplus.

While DOGE reports significant contract cancellations and some specific savings, external evaluations suggest that the actual budgetary impact may be less substantial than claimed.

Despite these efforts, the reported savings represent a fraction of DOGE's ambitious goal to cut $2 trillion in federal spending by July 4, 2026. 

The notion that Elon Musk and his government efficiency apparatchiks can bring down the debt is a tall order.  To be clear, I take no issue with rooting-out waste fraud and abuse; just give the chainsaw schtick and lame theatrics a rest.  

At this particular moment in time our outstanding debt stands at $36 trillion (give or take).  Closing a handful of government agencies and laying-off government workers makes for great theater but it isn't gonna get the job done.  The savings are much, much too small to achieve the stated goal. Anybody who actually believes nibbling around the edges like this will fix the real problem is engaging in what I call magical wishful thinking.

You see, just like a household budget that has gotten out of control, fixing this problem is going to require hard work and making difficult choices.  

You're probably thinking - Like what?

Like raising taxes, cutting defense spending or reforming Social Security and Medicare.  Or all of the foregoing.  These are unpopular choices for good reason.  Nobody wants to do them.  They're like going to the theater to watch a crappy production.  Nobody wants to do that.  The people demand good theater.  Bread and circuses if you will.  I might be wrong, but I happen to wonder if the current collection of clowns places a higher priority on theater and spectacle than hard work.

So, are we going to continue to be witness to the slow roll reality TV performance or get serious about fixing the real problem for the next couple of generations.

Anyone care to make a friendly wager?

DOGE Update

In the aftermath of the inauguration of Donald Trump we've witnessed the exiling of DOGE Bro Vivek Ramaswamy and Elon Musk's waffling on his promise of $2 trillion of government spending cuts.   

I have two DOGE updates:  Privacy and Theatrics.

Last week we learned that a federal judge halted access to the US Treasury's payment systems by Elon Musk's team of DOGE apparatchiks. The order came in response to a lawsuit filed by 19 state attorneys general accusing the president of failing to faithfully execute the nation's laws when he granted DOGE unfettered access to the federal payments system.

The White House had previously defended the DOGE's access as READ-ONLY, yet in the ruling the judge specifically invoked the Watergate Era Privacy Act of 1974, which states:  no agency shall disclose any record which is contained in a system of records by any means of communication to any person or to another agency.  

Let me begin by making abundantly clear I'm all about rooting out waste, fraud and abuse.  I embrace audits that adhere to Generally Accepted Accounting Principles. I believe in accountability. I place a high value on transparency. I hold close Reagan's admonition to Trust, But Verify.  Privacy is at the top of my list; which happens to be why I applaud the court ruling.

I would not voluntarily release my tax returns, charitable contributions, investment account and banking information, social security records, medicare details (including health records) or any other personal identifiers or privileged information to anyone without my prior written consent and assurance this information would be safeguarded.  

Rooting out fraud while simultaneously erecting appropriate firewalls to protect the integrity of a citizen's privileged personalty are not mutually exclusive. In my previous life my employer guarded this same information on behalf of their clients as if it were the Crown Jewels.  A security breach was always on the short list of of existential risks facing any financial services firm.  

To-wit, a couple of my MAGA pals think I'm nuts.  I'm overreacting.  Between you and me, for a couple of guys who howl at every opportunity about their impeccable conservative credentials; privacy ranks close to the bottom of priorities.

Go figure.  

Considering that Mr. Musk hasn't passed senate review or approval, has not received a security clearance, issued written ethics guidelines, or defined for anybody what he and his team intend to do with this data; naturally many of us have concerns.  Will they safeguard your identity?  Share it with whomever they please?  Retain it indefinitely?  Sell it?  Blackmail people with it? 

The question to you, dear readers, is the defense of personal information unreasonable?  

Would YOU voluntarily release the foregoing to Elon Musk without reservation?

Ponder that.

Meanwhile, DOGE has dismantled a Federal agency - USAID.  I've substituted a WIKI web link as the official .Gov website has been disappeared.  Meanwhile the name of the agency has been stricken from the building.  

Image - NBC

To be clear, the loss of USAID has no direct impact on my life so I don't have a dog in this fight.  Although I wonder if this signifies that we've thrown-in the towel on soft-power influence in response to stuff like Communist Red China's Belt and Road initiative, or North Korean and Soviet designs on African natural resources. Time will tell.

Meanwhile, I want to highlight the messaging power of what is known in political vernacular as a Play to the Base*  

Both Democrats and Republicans engage in these dramatic flourishes; and in this instance Elon Musk is championed for slaying the Great White Whale of foreign aid corruption.  Apologies for the Herman Melville metaphor but Trump is a master of this sort of theater.  

Consider this:

As crazy as it sounds opinion polling suggests that a plurality of Americans believe anywhere from 25 to 31 percent of the entire federal budget is foreign aid.  Wasteful fraud and abuse.  Every last damn dollar going to ungrateful heathens.  Naturally, that belief is fallacious because it is opinion and not fact.  US foreign aid (economic, nutrition, health and military) has historically hovered around 1% of the entire US budget; with USAID a small part of that total.  I've blogged about this before.

2023 aid managed by USAID totaled about $40 billion. You and I would likely agree that this sounds like a king's ransom to an average American; correct?  Yet in the grand scheme of our federal budget it is pocket change in the government's couch cushions.

If you unpack the numbers in the context of the entirety of the federal budget the savings amounts to 2% of Elon Musk's $2 trillion savings boast. 

Considering the context of erasing an entire agency; and assuming Washington never feeds another hungry Sub-Saharan child, vaccinates any heathens suffering an epidemic or offers any similar disaster aid these savings become basically permanent.  I take no issue that they are savings.  They are permanently exceedingly small.  

Even so, in the eyes of Trump supporters Musk is a Giant Killer.  

The melodrama of sweeping furloughs of slothful and ungrateful government workers, the erasure of an entire agency along with the trope of chiseling the name from the facade of the empty building is as close as you can get to modern-day angry Jesus giving the money changers the heave-ho from the temple.  

The theatrics are priceless.

So, let's agree this scalp in Musk's belt in only the first three weeks of the administration is yeoman's work. Or is it like the Battle of the Greasy Grass?  Spoiler Alert: The plains Indians took many scalps and still lost the war.

Ask yourself this:

Is the DOGE willing to hunt and scalp the prize 800 pound gorilla?

Or the administration to settle on collecting some small scalps for Reality TV* and forfeit the war?

Only time will tell.

Pro Tip Alert!  Be sure to stock-up on popcorn and adult beverages.  Both a Budget Reconciliation and the Debt Ceiling are in the on-deck circle.  I'm told it's gonna be easy peasy as Trump controls both Houses of Congress.

 

Doge - American Style

Doge - Venetian Italian for Duke - the highest official of the Republic of Venice.  Spanning the 8th to 18th centuries, more than a thousand years, the Doge was the sovereign ruler of the Venetian State.  

The palace of the Doge is famous for its flamboyant gothic architecture and its Great Council Chamber which houses possibly the largest oil on canvas painting in the world:  The Glory of Paradise by Jacopo Tintoretto.  As the primary residence of the Doge of Venice the palace was the physical manifestation of this supreme sovereign authority.

It is fitting that billionaire oligarchs Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy have been appointed sovereigns of the incoming Trump administration's Department of Government Efficiency or DOGE.  Of course, lacking the authority of a real government department there is no supreme authority.  

Sigh. 

Trump's transition team tells us that Musk and Ramaswamy are going to solve our country's debt problem. The DOGE is going to reduce the government's power, slash its workforce and crack-down on waste, fraud and abuse.  The sovereign oligarca announced they intend to reduce the federal budget by nearly thirty percent ($2 trillion).  So far, the chatter has been largely about cuts without much bandwidth devoted to a single ducat of additional revenue or investment in efficiency.  

Sure, I know it's early in the game and the president elect has yet to be sworn into office.  As a consequence I am resigned to the notion that for the present I will be subject to random dictum from Ramaswamy and Musk highlighting: The Usual Bill Of Fare.  Pledging to battle waste, fraud and abuse in Washington is as old as the hills.  Having been trotted-out with incessant frequency as a campaign promise by both sides it has become tread worn.  This spent refrain has become wearily uninspired.  It is tiresome.

Where to begin?  Try to stay with me as we take a deeper dive in the numbers. 

I've taken a run at this stuff before and it all comes down to money coming in (revenue) and money going out (expenses).  Nuanced by what is non-discretionary versus discretionary.  With a dose of old-fashioned politics thrown-in for good measure. 

The revenue side of the ledger includes a couple of large contributions; namely individual income taxes (about $2.2 trillion) and payroll taxes (about $1.6 trillion).  Smaller are corporate income taxes (about $420 billion) and various duties and tariffs, sales, estate and excise taxes (roughly $228 billion).  For the 2023 fiscal year money-in totaled $4.4 trillion+.

The president-elect has promised to reduce individual and corporate income taxes by at least $5 trillion over 10 years; reducing the money coming-in.  He has also promised substantial new tariffs on imports; although no estimates have been revealed for these tax increases.

Social Security and Medicare would be difficult to cut as Trump has promised he would not.  Nevertheless, both programs are living on borrowed time.  Without additional revenues and changes to the retirement formula, the Social Security and Medicare trust funds are already under stress from an aging population.  They will run out of money in 2033 and 2036 respectively.  This means that current retirees will experience a significant cut to their benefits anyway.  Trump's promise to end taxes on Social Security would accelerate the arrival of these cuts.

On the expense side of the ledger the three largest non-discretionary expenditures include the fore-mentioned Social Security and Medicare, federal civilian and military retirement and veteran benefits.  Total non-discretionary spending for 2023 was $3.8 trillion. 

There is an additional $659 billion of net interest (give or take) on the outstanding national debt.  It stands alone; but added to the non-discretionary component of the federal budget gets us to a grand total of $4.5 trillion.

What's left?  Discretionary spending of $1.7 trillion.  Included in this category is defense and roughly $9 trillion in non-defense spending.

Non-discretionary and discretionary explained

Non-discretionary programs are deemed mandatory spending which means funding doesn't require passage of an annual appropriation by Congress.  By example: if the DOGE Bros want to reduce Social Security, Medicare, federal retirement benefits (military and civilian) Congress would have to pass legislation reducing or defunding these benefits.  

There is net interest on the national debt -  almost $700 billion.  The credit-worthiness of our nation hinges on our promise to pay our debts.  I don't believe the DOGE Bros would recommend defaulting on the debt or devaluing our currency putting their own wealth at great peril.

On the discretionary side of the spending ledger the DOGE Illuminati have tweeted about unsupported billions upon billions of defense payments that cannot be tracked or audited. I'll not argue there isn't waste, fraud and abuse or other similar leakage in the defense budget; but not enough to reduce the federal budget by 30 percent.  I suppose Musk and Ramaswamy might recommend that Congress kill the F-35 program.  Alas, there is that nagging matter of Congress, national security and jobs. 

What's left? 

That leaves a grab-bag of leftovers the DOGE can submit to Congress and the President for elimination and defunding.  In the grab-bag is found Assistance to Individuals (namely nutritional and healthcare programs), transfers to states (Medicaid coverage for poor people, education, roads, bridges, highways, ports, airports and other infrastructure), National Parks, the National Weather Service, arts funding (public broadcasting); you get the drift.  

Of course, in the grand scheme of things, this grab-bag of leftovers doesn't even come close to scratching the surface of reducing the federal budget by thirty percent.  And here's the catch; a considerable portion of the grab-bag is decidedly popular with much of the public.  Defunding it would result in a cascade of serious budget shortfalls for the states leaving all the governors and the people very grumpy.  

The challenge for Trump and the DOGE is that a 10,000 foot view of the discretionary side of the federal budget reveals that it is just two things - military and defense; including a vast health and social insurance program that comes with it; and everything else.  Compared to defense, the rest of the discretionary budget is much more transparent because average Americans are witness almost on a daily basis to weather forecasting, highways, air traffic control, public broadcasting, national parks and monuments.  They cost relatively little money in a ginormous federal budget and are generally liked.

I readily admit I struggle with coming-across as slightly snarky about quirky oligarchs like Musk and Ramaswamy; they're billionaires after-all.  Who among us actually believe they are sincerely empathetic to the needs and wants of ordinary Americans?  How many of you think they relish the attention of the Trump reality show?   These juxtapositions mean they have to work harder at candor and authenticity if they want to be taken seriously and actually add value to the incoming administration.

If the DOGE only looks at cutting the budget their task may become virtually impossible as it would result in a significant disruption of services average Americans have come to expect from government.  The DOGE must explore creative initiatives that require investment in efficiencies and alternative sources of revenue and think big.  They need to go after the big money to make a historic splash. 

I'll let you in on a secret:  They need to shift that thing we refer to as an 800 pound gorilla.  They need to look to Social Security and Medicare - the root cause of our budget woes.  The subject politicians are so loathe to speak-of that they tip toe and shrink from it like timid sissies.   

I am not being snarky - if Elon and Vivek put their thinking caps on and put their minds to meaningful reform of both of these programs with a view to securing their future for the next couple of generations it would be earthshaking and enshrine their boss in history.  Who knows, I might even become a believer.

To be clear this would be a heavy lift.  Politically-fraught too.  The last president to pull it off was Ronald Reagan.

I wish them well as President-elect Trump will be a lame duck president; with effectively only a couple of years to implement meaningful change.   Which may partially explain why only a few days ago the richest man in the world is now walking-back his boast of $2 trillion budget cuts.    

There is enough meat on this bone there is a high probability of another couple-three blog posts to do it justice.  And since it is very early in the game there is ample time for bonafide policy to evolve and unfold.  Detailed policy which will improve your and my prosperity and general lot in life.  And perhaps make the world a safer place.

Of course, There is time for additional hedging and moving of goal posts; so stay tuned.

Cheers!

Report Card

Exhausted by the blistering pace of governing our House of Representatives have now beaten it out of town for a much-deserved three week vacation.

After a year at the legislative grindstone the 118th Congress passed a total of 22 bills into law making this the least productive legislative session since 1931.  Of course the 1931 congress was only in session for the month of December.  

It is entirely possible that no Congress in our nation's long and storied history has spent so much time accomplishing so little as this one.

Congratulations.

Sunday Morning Deficit Hawk

Speaking of the 800 pound gorilla in our government's living room that nobody wishes to acknowledge here is something you can do on your own to see how you measure-up on the debt ceiling discussion.

I've been called a lot of names in my life but this is something that I'm actually proud to be called

Deficit Hawk

How much would you cut the national debt? 

You can play the game over here at the Washington Post. 

Sunday Morning Gorilla

Sure, you're probably thinking I'm going to launch into another rant or diatribe about the 800 pound gorilla sitting in our respective sitting rooms.  No rant this morning.  Just a few factual observations; the first of which is that Trump and now Biden have avoided addressing the primary cause of our budget woes. 

When I tapped-out this post a couple of days ago It was basically impossible to read, view or listen to any media outlet without a reminder about the debt ceiling debate.

To be clear, this is a scary subject inasmuch as while our country has sufficient income to pay the interest on our debt (the bondholders) we also have a $1.5 trillion shortfall in 2023 to pay for all of the previous spending authorized by all the previous congresses and signed into law by all of the previous presidents.  From a purely technical perspective this isn't about a budget - this is about paying for the spending that we're already on the hook for.

That said, there is now a parallel discussion about the budget; which is a positive development.  Appropriations is where this discussion belongs; the debt ceiling is about paying for past obligations.  Yet make no mistake, unless the ceiling is raised we will have insufficient funds to pay for all of our lawful obligations including Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

Between you and me I don't believe there will be a default.  Anyone holding an IOU (government bond) will collect their interest on time and congress and the president will agree on some sort of scheme to address discretionary spending.  There is a high probability congress will convene some sort of Blue Ribbon Committee to study a weight loss plan for the 800 pound gorilla.  Of course I am notoriously famous for my bad predictions and while Kevin McCarthy is legislating he is bedeviled by a small number of crackpot members of his caucus who love outrageous tweets, reckless and inflammatory rhetoric and generally performative politics.  Just like the congressional nutjobs who extol the virtuousness of Vladimir Putin, they're cuckoo.  Why is it that some people elected to congress spout such outrageous  foolishness?  Is this a mechanism to fund raise?  Or a means to draw attention on cable programming?  Suck all the oxygen from the room?  Childish attention-getting behavior?  It's stupid, I'll never understand it and I digress.

We have a debt limit problem inasmuch as we continually borrow to make ends meet.  And the fundamental driver of our spending has been the growth of Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.  Insufficiently funded, this leads to borrowing. This is the 800 pound gorilla.   Does it strike you as strange that neither Trump or Biden could be bothered  to acknowledge this?  You know who has talked about it?  Governor DeSantis.  But I digress. 

Source: Office of Management and Budget, 05.16.23

Consider this, in 2023 those three items will for the first time, will account for more than one-half of the entirety of the federal budget.  Furthermore, these three items account for just shy of 11% of our Gross Domestic Product (GDP).  In three decades this is projected to rise to 15% of our GDP. 

If you do the math the issue in our living room is we are presently borrowing to pay for an 800 pound gorilla today that could  grow to a 1200 pound gorilla in the years to come.  Creating a King Kong is not sustainable.

So, instead of fabricating a crisis and potential self-inflicted wound over paying for stuff that all of the foregoing congresses and presidents have passed into law we need to be holding a serious discussion about how we reform the largest programs in the budget.  Truthfully, the very best opportunity to reform our entitlement programs is when we enjoy rare periods of divided government.  Like right now.

No amount of shrinking the IRS, defunding the FBI, or clawing-back of COVID relief funds is going to plug a $1.5 trillion shortfall.  This is not rocket science.  This is simple math. 

While a handful of coconut congressional troublemakers might delight in gleefully blowing-up the economy, tanking the stock market, spiking our future borrowing costs and destroying everyone's carefully-built retirement plan with a default; I'm going to keep my eye on any serious zookeepers in congress and maybe a president who might take a stab at taming the growth of the gorilla and keep this country on a steady path of economic growth.  Yes, virtually every indicator supports the notion that the economy is presently doing quite well. Let's stipulate that too much debt can kill the economy. But that is another discussion for another day. 

This blogger isn't going to hold his breath over entitlement reform.  As it doesn't stand a chance of happening until after the 2024 election and we know who's in-charge of congress and the white house.

Until then, it appears that we've got bullshit culture wars to fight.  So, grab a cold bottle of Bud Light to assuage any festering election denial and my serious-bad predictions.

Whistling past the grave yard.

Hostage Taking

So it would appear that we're going to be witness to a grand game of chicken as our nation has once again bumped up against a technical limit on how much debt it can issue.  Before too long, all the moving of chess pieces on the financial board will be exhausted.  Analysts from the realm of my former day job are already warning that the fight could tip from partisan brinkmanship into some serious economic and market badness. 

The GOP holds the House by a slim majority and Speaker McCarthy has made it clear that they want deep spending cuts in exchange for raising the debt limit.  To be clear, raising the debt limit is a requirement to paying for all that has been previously spent on behalf of all of the previous Presidents and Congresses.  Think of going to a restaurant and after reviewing the menu you order several courses of delicious food, you consume it and it is well on its way to digesting.  Now you have to pay the tab.  If you refuse to pay the bill that is bad form.  

You are a deadbeat.

If you are fond of wagers take note that Bank of America has suggested that a default in late summer or early fall is the odds-on favorite.

This blogger takes no issue with sensible budgeting and fiscal responsibility.  Along with keeping their nose out of my business and personal life my daddy's GOP was all over that.

On the other hand if all you want to do is blow-up shit and burn it to the ground that's called nihilism.  Nihilism is not Conservatism. 

Good governance is more aspirational.  

It's not hostage-taking.

Stay-tuned for the shit show and hope for normal congressmen to prevail over the nihilists.

I'm fully-stocked with Merlot and popcorn.

Red Ink

According to the nonpartisan public policy group Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget the budget deal that was passed by the House is expected to be approved by the Senate.  After which President Trump will sign into law an additional $4.1 trillion to the national debt.  Record-setting red ink.    

There is a low probability that enough GOP defections in the Senate may queer the deal.  If not - Republicans will own deficit-financed legislation. 

After railing against the debt and deficit for years it’s certainly not your daddy’s GOP any longer…..

Your Border Security Hard at Work

Two years ago President Trump signed an executive order to hire 15,000 new border agents.

As a consequence, Customs and Border Protection paid $60.7 million to the consulting firm Accenture Federal Services to recruit, vet and hire 7,500 such officers over five years. 

While pricey in the private sector that figure of $8,000 per recruit sounds like a reasonable outlay by federal government law-enforcement standards.

In two years the Trump contractor has hired 33 officers. 

Amortized cost is just under $2 million per recruit. Yup.

Meanwhile, historic lows in illegal immigration on the US-Mexican border has prompted the Department of Homeland Security's inspector general to question whether more hires are even necessary.

Just the facts and truth.  Move along now.  Nothing to see.  No crisis here.

More on this story here.

Theater of the Absurd

There are nine congressional districts that are associated with our 2,000-mile southern border. 

While the notion of a wall is popular among Trump supporters in North Dakota, Montana and Wisconsin it is a fact that each and every one of the members of congress representing the good people of these nine border congressional districts have one thing in common. 

Each is against President Donald Trump's border wall.  They’re all in favor of stronger border control and security measures but they’re all in agreement that walls don’t work and are a waste of taxpayer resources

Go figure….

Notable Quotable

A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you're talking about real money.

 

- Everett Dirksen
 

Once upon a time Republicans were the guardians of fiscal restraint – or at least they paid lip service to such.  In Trump World Republicans can now lay claim to the largest budget deficit in a half-dozen years with billions upon billions of dollars of interest payments that will take generations to pay-off.  If at all.  It rather makes the era of Obama look like an exercise in financial self-discipline. 

That light at the end of the tunnel is a trillion-plus deficit in the next fiscal year. 

A world record – and a gift of conservative government. 

Public Shakedown

$24 billion 

Yup, billion with a letter B.  

That is the amount of money spent on stadiums — professional, amateur and college — by state and local governments since 1990.  It is a staggering figure for sure and does the expenditure pay-off in the end?   

Some have suggested that the economics are thin soup.   Employment opportunities are mostly part-time, seasonal or temporary work.  Moreover, local spending—which might otherwise find its way into local pubs, restaurants, bowling alleys, and cinemas—ends-up in the pockets of millionaire athletes and billionaire owners. 

Read the Atlantic’s startlingly cerebral analysis here.

Uncharted Territory

Hard to believe we spent the final six years of Obama's time in office playing a game of chicken over shutting down the government and flirting with default.  All over purported concerns about our nation's fiscal future.  None of it meant anything.  The Trump budget is now expected to push annual deficits over $1 trillion within two years.

Republican control of government has now produced a ten-year outlook likely to push publicly held national debt close to $30 trillion by 2028. Debt as a percentage of the economy would be the highest since 1946 and perhaps the highest ever recorded - depending on how much of the tax bill is extended.

With total debt climbing to 100 percent of GDP one can only imagine the consequences.  Higher interest rates?  Competition crowding-out private investment?  Economic stagnation?

Uncharted territory.

Ballooning Deficit

According to the Congressional Budget Office the annual deficit will top $1 trillion by 2020.  Of course, this is because Congress has cut taxes and increased spending.

Me thinks Republicans have lost all moral authority as it might pertain to government spending.

How to Sensibly Amortize Your Transportation Costs

click on images to enlarge

Yesterday the 2007 GMC Acadia flipped to 165,000 miles on our road trip to the Gulf Coast and back.  That’s a lot of miles on a vehicle that is getting a bit long in the tooth.  Nevertheless, the amortized cost per mile has been quite reasonable by my estimation.  And with fingers crossed won't increase and will hopefully decline.  Current plans are to drive this beast until the wheels fall-off.  Or retirement.  Whichever comes first.  All of which is subject to change at a moment’s notice or on a personal whim.  Bottom line is Jill and I want to make sure we squeeze every last nickle of value out of a depleting asset.

In any event, just about the same time the odometer flipped we crossed this bridge.  The observant reader will notice the dearth of traffic.  We crossed this bridge twice - traveling south and returning north.  And we made the same observation each time.  Wide-open spaces.  For context about this uncongested crossing some background is in order.  

The Ohio River Bridges Project was a transportation project involving the reconstruction of the Kennedy Interchange and the construction of two new Ohio River bridges. The Abraham Lincoln Bridge opened in December of 2015 and is located in downtown Louisville and slightly upstream from the John F. Kennedy Memorial Bridge – completed in 1963 as part of the Interstate 65 project.   This is the Kennedy Bridge on the left and the new Abraham Lincoln Bridge on the right.   

The second bridge – the Lewis and Clark Bridge - opened in December of 2016 connecting Indiana SR 265 and the Kentucky segment of I-265 (via KY-841) between Louisville's East end and Utica, Indiana.  

The Ohio River Bridges project weighed-in at a total cost of $2.6 billion and has been widely criticized for its outrageous expense and for degrading the connection between downtown Louisville and the riverfront.  Both bridges are supported by tolls.  Unfortunately the traffic counts on both are down and nowhere near the traffic projections used to ‘sell’ the project.  It will be interesting to see if future traffic counts rise to a level sufficient to cover the bonding costs of $2,600,000,000.    -Wikipedia

You can learn more about the economics of this issue here.

Government Money for your Gas

Congress (in its infinite wisdom) is weighing additional government subsidies for the most expensive fossil-fuel power plant ever built in the United States.

Southern Company's Kemper County, MS power plan has suffered numerous cost overruns driving the cost to nearly $7 billion.  The plant will not come online until sometime in 2017.  Maybe.  With the in-coming administration's enthusiasm for preserving coal mining jobs legislation is being crafted to award an additional taxpayer-funded windfall of up to $4.5 billion to capture carbon dioxide and transport it via pipeline to oilfields for injection deep in the earth to aid in the extraction of oil.

Am I the only one who is dismayed by the circular irony of the wasteful boondoggle?  Hardly green technology.  And unable to stand on its own economic merits you and I have to prop it up.

Carbon dioxide (in case you don't know this already) is the stuff we exhale after ever breath. 

The Wall Street Journal does a decent job of covering this here.  It's worth a read.