Summary

Elon Musk is distancing himself from sweeping federal job cuts linked to DOGE, blaming agency heads—not DOGE—responsible for mass layoffs, including the announced 70,000 job cut at Veterans Affairs.

Despite claiming DOGE’s role as merely advisory, Musk admitted to mistakes in private meetings with GOP lawmakers and pledged to correct them.

Some cuts have already been reversed, with a Trump administration memo clarifying agencies are not required to fire probationary employees (new hires).

  • roofTophopper@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    58
    ·
    2 days ago

    Man, fuck this guy. 100000% all him. You don’t get to distance yourself from this when you’re the one holding the bloody knife. Fuck everything this guy does. Every single day this guy needs to be reminded of how much of a fuck up he is.

  • IamSparticles@lemmy.zip
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    31
    ·
    2 days ago

    The billionaire bureaucrat has claimed this defense to his organization’s cost-cutting measures before, saying that DOGE simply makes recommendations for cuts to agency heads, and then it’s up to those heads to execute them.

    “It’s not MY fault they did what I told them to do!”

    • Fedizen@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      20
      ·
      2 days ago

      Its not just that but they fired multiple agency heads for not obeying his orders. Its farcical when he’s choosing the agency heads

  • yarr@feddit.nl
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    22
    arrow-down
    1
    ·
    2 days ago

    Elon Musk is saving the US money in the same way that not paying your mortgage saves money. The real question to ask is not “how much are we spending on X” but “Are the benefits we receive for paying for X worth it?” No surprise, that deeper analysis is NOT being done because fans of the right are just out for blood in the form of cancelled government programs. After all, why not? Trump has told them for years now that the government lies, that every single program is flush with waste and so on. They are basically getting what they asked for, except they never considered the deeper effects. This is why the right wants uneducated masses. If they aren’t using critical thinking skills, they’re perfect supporters.

    • Lemminary@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      4
      ·
      2 days ago

      I think the reason for the spending cuts is so they can justify a massive tax cut for the rich. They will be essentially paying nothing, but your pleb taxes will go up and your pleb services canceled in the name of plutocratic profit.

      • yarr@feddit.nl
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        3
        ·
        2 days ago

        For sure. Like usual, he’s not motivated by just a pure hate for government programs. As always, it’s a grift. Look at the $TRUMP crypto project. He doesn’t feel bad fleecing his biggest fans. And why should he? They will never figure it out. They will just blame their lack of money on Biden or something.

  • Corkyskog@sh.itjust.works
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    14
    ·
    edit-2
    2 days ago

    I really hope this becomes a modern day Icarus story of a billionaire who flew too close to the sun and then set off a radical turn events for the better.

  • Grizzlyboy@lemm.ee
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    48
    ·
    2 days ago

    If you were the richest person in the entire world, by a huge margin!!! Would you start working in the government and have tons of responsibilities? Or would you retire and live the life you’ve dreamed of?

    This guy is insane.

    • spooky2092@lemmy.blahaj.zone
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      11
      ·
      2 days ago

      This guy is insane.

      Pretty sure he’s got “a” personality disorder that makes him crave being in the spotlight, and the dude isn’t smart or socially aware enough to understand just how little the dude knows. Leading him to doing more and more stupid shit to stay in the spotlight and scrambling to unfuck himself after the fact. On some level, it would be funny how he’s been tripping over his dick and failing upward his whole life. Ya know, if he weren’t currently destroying the country and all that.

      • ArcturusRoot@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        6
        ·
        2 days ago

        And don’t forget the army of enabling and validating mouthbreathers who buy that he’s a genius, when he’s really a fraud at every level. If it wasn’t for Daddy’s Money, he’d be a stereotypical stoner who works part time at some low wage job only to spend most of his time sucking at gaming.

    • negativeone@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      8
      ·
      2 days ago

      We recognize that if someone just wants to consume an infinite amount of alcohol then they have an addiction. We recognize addictions to food, and sex, and shopping.

      But we worship money so much that we’ve completely failed to recognize that you can be addicted to money, too. You can be so obsessed with it that you hurt people around you, that you damage your community, and want to consume vastly more than you need. In the case of billionaires, their addiction has caused them to accumulate so much money that it’s destroying the global economy, and it’s still not enough.

      We’re like an irresponsible bartender, serving them more and more regardless of the damage. It’s time to cut these people off. Once you’ve got a billion, you’ve had enough. Go home.

    • caged_danimal@midwest.social
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      9
      ·
      2 days ago

      Would you start working in the government and have tons of responsibilities?

      Your confusion is that you think Elon could possibly feel responsibility. He gets more free money and all the access he could ever want. He gets power to bend other countries to his will.

    • ayyy@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      2
      ·
      2 days ago

      He must have committed some truly heinous crimes so now he has to amass power to protect himself.

  • undystains@lemm.ee
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    80
    ·
    3 days ago

    Bro mistook a bunch of Russian bots praising him in his echo chamber as real people.

  • Brdi29@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    44
    ·
    3 days ago

    Musk privately acknowledged that he’d made some massive missteps, and that he “can’t bat a thousand all the time,”

    You got rid of all the gear for your team, you’re not batting at all wtf

  • Match!!@pawb.social
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    82
    ·
    3 days ago

    Someone should tell Trump that he can just confiscate all of Musk’s assets at any time and instantly become the richest man in the world.

    (The truth of this statement is not relevant to whether Trump should be told this.)

    • gamer@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      37
      ·
      3 days ago

      he has immunity from criminal prosecution, and it could be claimed that Elon (an illegal immigrant) has assets that can be used to help pay off the national debt.

      • CurlyWurlies4All@slrpnk.net
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        22
        ·
        edit-2
        2 days ago

        The Cheeto could straight up shoot him dead in the oval office, then alter Elon’s last will and testament live on TV and nobody could do jack shit about it.

  • lepinkainen@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    15
    ·
    2 days ago

    Please Americans give the democrats the congress, so they can force Elmo into multi-week hearings Hunter Biden style. Make him lie under oath so much he’ll never recover

    • Carighan Maconar@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      6
      ·
      2 days ago

      Bold of you to assume the current administration will let you vote, except maybe as for where specifically the concentration camps for LGBTQ people will be built.

      • Corkyskog@sh.itjust.works
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        1
        ·
        2 days ago

        It’s one of those funny nuances of the USA though. Their elections are handled by the states, so they can only rig so much.

    • skuzz@discuss.tchncs.de
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      5
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      2 days ago

      Why, so they can show up in pink dresses and wave signs some more? The majority of them are just the other side of the oligarch coin at this point.

      • 60d@lemmy.ca
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        1
        ·
        2 days ago

        Murca needs electoral reform to a system of proportional representation.

    • stopforgettingit@lemmy.dbzer0.com
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      5
      arrow-down
      2
      ·
      2 days ago

      If you think the current batch of democrats will do this even if they have control of congress, be ready for disappointment. The dem establishment is too busy trying to preserve the status quo to actually stand up for the right of the people.