Elon Musk’s goals for the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) have been pretty straightforward. He aims to address wasteful spending and eliminate unnecessary regulations.
It seems like an idea everybody could get behind on both sides of the aisle. After all, there’s no good reason not to stop wasting money. Oddly enough, though, there has been significant resistance from the usual suspects.
Musk’s initial targets have included updating outdated IT systems and reducing bureaucratic inefficiencies. He also intends to ensure transparency by posting all DOGE actions online and tackling issues such as failed audits and unauthorized federal expenditures.
To give you some idea of the utter waste and fraud, the Pentagon is unable to account for roughly $3 trillion of its own assets. Yeah… there’s plenty of room for improvement.
Again, who could possibly be opposed to that mission? He’s the world’s richest man, having run multiple companies. He knows what he’s doing when it comes to making departments more efficient and ultimately responsible to those of us who fork over the money.
While Democrats are up in arms, those actually dealing in arms seem to be warming to Musk’s efforts.
Defense Industry Execs Becoming Fans Of Elon Musk And DOGE
Elon Musk and his DOGE team have garnered significant interest from defense industry leaders, who see it as an opportunity to streamline procurement at the Department of Defense.
CEOs from defense firms like L3Harris, Palantir, Lockheed Martin, and others have expressed optimism about DOGE’s potential to cut red tape and bureaucratic inefficiencies.
Especially at the Pentagon, a department that has never passed an audit since they’ve been conducting them.
Since the requirement for federal agencies to undergo annual audits was established, the Department of Defense (DoD) has been unable to achieve a clean, unmodified audit opinion. This has been the case for every audit conducted since the first one in 2018, but it’s not a new problem. Some may recall that former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said on September 10, 2001 that the Pentagon couldn’t account for $2.3 trillion in spending.
“Disruption, at the end of the day, exposes things that aren’t working,” Palantir CEO Alex Karp tells QUARTZ. “There’ll be ups and downs. This is a revolution. Some people can get their heads cut off.”
It’s not very eloquent, but what do you expect from a defense contractor?
RELATED: Elon Musk’s DOGE Efficiency Squad Is Already Shutting Down Federal Contractor Payments
Slash And Burn
A lot of people are already getting cut off by Elon Musk and his DOGE associates. As evidenced by their efforts regarding the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), which Musk refers to as a “criminal organization” that must “die.”
On Wednesday, USAID announced that nearly all of its staff will be on leave starting Friday night, according to a statement on their website. The process of cleaning up the organization has been expedited significantly.
Deputy administrator for the agency, Pete Marocco, said USAID had until Friday to recall all overseas employees. Those who were not successfully returned by that deadline were to be “evacuated” by the United States military.
The DOGE initiative has been described as a “revolution” by Karp, suggesting it could disrupt traditional defense contracting methods.
DOGE’s focus on efficiency aligns with the defense industry’s push for less regulation and quicker acquisition processes, though it’s surprising when the United States government is widely known for vastly overpaying for military equipment.
The defense sector views DOGE’s reforms as a chance to improve their business operations with the government. And that, by extension, could potentially increase their profits.
Most Americans support huge defense budgets. It shouldn’t be too much to ask that the money is spent transparently and efficiently. After all, it’s ours.
