Yeah. Essentially this will bring about a new form of redlining.
Dept. of Gov. Efficiency
- Thread starter Mr. G
- Start date
Pinball1970
Valued Senior Member
I watched a podcast that made that point. Start up tech companies in sustainable energy could lose out on grants. Musk rivals could be targeted including electric and alternative energy vehicle R&D.
The money goes to where Trump says it goes and Musk pushes on with potential new competition taking the hit.
Meanwhile the rest of the world continues to invest in new technologies putting the US at a disadvantage when the next administration takes over.
Four years is quite a long time in R&D.
exchemist
Valued Senior Member
What “next administration”?
A Trump loyalist controls the Dept of Justice, which is in charge of those who enforce compliance with court orders. Musk and others can ignore them if they can’t be enforced. The same will go for breaches of electoral law.
Once the courts are ignored you have “autocratic breakthrough”: a one-way ticket to dictatorship, or one party rule in perpetuity.
And with a Democratic Party that has been weak and ineffectual for decades, there is essentially no organized resistance to this. The GOP has long made their own damn agenda, and dissenters be damned; whereas the Democrats have openly campaigned upon what is popular--as dictated by polling--which is weirdly antithetical to their ostensible position, which is providing a voice for disenfranchised minorities and the like, who are--by definition--not "popular". Like campaigning with Liz Cheney, for instance, whose sole decent quality is that she was opposed to Trump's violent insurrection.
Not that any of that matters. The GOP controls the executive, legislative, and judicial branches of government, and I don't think we can count on even a handful of Republicans to grow a spine and do the right thing.
Pinball1970
Valued Senior Member
From another site, this in a Nature article.
So I mentioned novel sustainable technologies specifically but this will hit medical research. This on top of pulling out of the WHO.
"His administration has abruptly canceled research-grant reviews, travel and training for scientists inside and outside the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the world’s largest public biomedical funder. . . . The cancelling of meetings and travel is part of a pause in external communications issued on 21 January by the NIH’s parent organization, the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Researchers who spoke to Nature say that although a short, daylong pause in communications at US agencies has occurred in the past when new administrations have started, to reorient strategy, the reach and length of the Trump team’s — it is set to last until at least 1 February — is unprecedented. Without advisory-committee meetings, the NIH cannot issue research grants, temporarily freezing 80% of the agency’s US$47-billion budget that funds research across the country and beyond. . . . This is a short pause to allow the new team to set up a process for review and prioritization. ”
So I mentioned novel sustainable technologies specifically but this will hit medical research. This on top of pulling out of the WHO.
"His administration has abruptly canceled research-grant reviews, travel and training for scientists inside and outside the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the world’s largest public biomedical funder. . . . The cancelling of meetings and travel is part of a pause in external communications issued on 21 January by the NIH’s parent organization, the US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Researchers who spoke to Nature say that although a short, daylong pause in communications at US agencies has occurred in the past when new administrations have started, to reorient strategy, the reach and length of the Trump team’s — it is set to last until at least 1 February — is unprecedented. Without advisory-committee meetings, the NIH cannot issue research grants, temporarily freezing 80% of the agency’s US$47-billion budget that funds research across the country and beyond. . . . This is a short pause to allow the new team to set up a process for review and prioritization. ”
foghorn
Valued Senior Member
Weirder and weirder, it started with Trump knowingly playing the God card to get votes, but could end up with Trump actually believing it himself.
Trump’s thinking...Why do the American people need to vote at all. They got me and my associated pals looking after their needs.
Didn’t God save me for this very reason.
Note to self... Get Musky to check out those preachers that may start to question my divine right.
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Years ago the Grace Commission report identified issues with federal spending that should have been addressed. Musk is gutting federal operations to the point of making the federal government nonfunctional.
I hope Musk is not reducing federal spending so Trump can go on a land acquisition spending spree. Trump seems to want to render the people of Gaza homeless so he can build a luxury resort there. Reminds me of when Trump tried to force out an elderly widow so he could build a parking garage.
Hope that the courts can slow them down until Congress does something.
I hope Musk is not reducing federal spending so Trump can go on a land acquisition spending spree. Trump seems to want to render the people of Gaza homeless so he can build a luxury resort there. Reminds me of when Trump tried to force out an elderly widow so he could build a parking garage.
Hope that the courts can slow them down until Congress does something.
exchemist
Valued Senior Member
Let’s hope. But the very real fear now is that the courts are toothless, for the reasons I outlined in post 23.
I think now it comes down to how far they think they can go without setting off some kind of popular uprising, such as a general strike, demonstrations that gum up cities etc. Because that is where I think the US is heading, at speed. Direct popular action may soon be the only way to stop this putsch.
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As long as you're happy, I guess.
But things like this stand out:
We get it: You don't like bicyclists or dogs--also, you don't seem to grasp that dogs cannot run 100+ miles a day, and therefore a workaround is required when the person is traveling that distance. You've also got some fucked up opinions about Black people, rape, addiction, the homeless, a lot of things really.
But what does any of this have to do with the matter under discussion? Can you--and I know this a challenging term for you--discern relevance?
sculptor
Valued Senior Member
What do you expect?
exchemist
Valued Senior Member
I think Trump is just the figurehead for these Prarject 2025 people: Vance, Vought, Musk, Thiel et al. They harness his psychopathy and solipsism, but he is not the one who has worked out how to seize power from the other branches of government. They have been working on it for several years.
Seattle
Valued Senior Member
Yes. I know that your line of taunting isn't relevant and that you are just pouring gas on a fire rather than adding anything useful to this forum.
Seattle
Valued Senior Member
Yes. I know that your line of taunting isn't relevant and that you are just pouring gas on a fire rather than adding anything useful to this forum.
??
The question was "How many businesses in the USA would fail without government subsidies?" The answer is "a great many" as I detailed above.
Now, if you'd like to talk about what Trump is going to eliminate, feel free.
When I worked at Skydive San Diego we had a couple show up (skydivers) who had biked across the US with their dog in a carrier. Great people.
I did that once, in order to transport our dog to and from the vet nearby. She was having surgery and it was way easier to lift a 100lb dog into a trailer four inches off the ground than into a car 2 feet off the ground.
Seattle
Valued Senior Member
Your definition of "subsidies" is "government". No one is arguing for no government. How many times does this need to be repeated?
A third example might be to use unscrupolous hackers for DOGE workers who leak your information (for a hefty fee of course) to people who wish you ill. But they'd never do something like that right?
Edward Coristine, the youngest of Elon Musk’s DOGE whiz kids at 19 years old, was previously fired from an internship after he allegedly leaked a data security firm’s sensitive information to its competitor, a Bloomberg report reveals.
In a June 2022 message reviewed by Bloomberg, an executive with Path Network confirmed that Coristine “has been terminated,” and called his behavior “unacceptable.” The exec added, “There is zero tolerance for this." . . . . "I can confirm that Edward Coristine’s brief contract was terminated after the conclusion of an internal investigation into the leaking of proprietary company information that coincided with his tenure.”
But that would never happen TWICE, right?
TheVat
Registered Senior Member
Clearly. Musk has been wanting shake all those pesky federal investigations and safety regs off his back for years.
How Elon Musk's crusade against government could benefit Tesla
Elon Musk has long railed against the U.S. government, saying numerous investigations and safety programs have stymied Tesla, his electric car company, and its efforts to create fleets of robotaxis and other self-driving automobiles.
apnews.com
WASHINGTON (AP) — Elon Musk has long railed against the U.S. government, saying a crushing number of federal investigations and safety programs have stymied Tesla, his electric car company, and its efforts to create fleets of robotaxis and other self-driving automobiles.
Now, Musk’s close relationship with President Donald Trump means many of those federal headaches could vanish within weeks or months.
On the potential chopping block: crash investigations into Tesla’s partially automated vehicles; a Justice Department criminal probe examining whether Musk and Tesla have overstated their cars’ self-driving capabilities; and a government mandate to report crash data on vehicles using technology like Tesla’s Autopilot....
No, it is money paid out to companies to do public work for the government. Webster defines a subsidy as "a grant by a government to a private person or company or to another government to assist an undertaking thought helpful to the public."
Examples:
EPA regulating emissions? Not a subsidy.
Paying a construction company to fix a road? Subsidy.
Passing laws against rape? Not a subsidy.
Paying a scientists to research public health issues? Subsidy.
Let me know if I need to define it in more detail for you.
This is surreal. The US is already pretty lax with respect to safety standards, from automobiles to "foods" we ingest. Tangentially, but not unrelated, very few countries pretty much just hand you a driver's license when you turn 16. Turning what is essentially a deadly weapon already into a more literal, and likely, death trap is beyond idiocy.Clearly. Musk has been wanting shake all those pesky federal investigations and safety regs off his back for years.
How Elon Musk's crusade against government could benefit Tesla
Elon Musk has long railed against the U.S. government, saying numerous investigations and safety programs have stymied Tesla, his electric car company, and its efforts to create fleets of robotaxis and other self-driving automobiles.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Elon Musk has long railed against the U.S. government, saying a crushing number of federal investigations and safety programs have stymied Tesla, his electric car company, and its efforts to create fleets of robotaxis and other self-driving automobiles.
Now, Musk’s close relationship with President Donald Trump means many of those federal headaches could vanish within weeks or months.
On the potential chopping block: crash investigations into Tesla’s partially automated vehicles; a Justice Department criminal probe examining whether Musk and Tesla have overstated their cars’ self-driving capabilities; and a government mandate to report crash data on vehicles using technology like Tesla’s Autopilot....