Right Size It

Think about what "conservatives" have been preaching at us forever:

"Government is bad because it's gotten too big, and all they ever do is finagle ways to steal from hard-working taxpayers so they can redistribute our wealth to the undeserving."

And of course, when they say "undeserving", they're referring mostly to women and brown people - but until recently, they haven't said that part out loud and in public.

Now then: Since the 1950s, the federal government, as a percentage of our GDP, has stayed very much the same. There was a bump during COVID, but for 70 years, the federal government HAS NOT grown relative to the population.

So, with some notable exceptions - I still think the Pentagon's accounting is pretty sketchy - the federal gubmint is about the right size. Maybe we're just seeing the Tyranny Of Large Numbers doing its thing.

ie: DOD could be extremely efficient, with a waste percentage lower than is possible for normal people. Let's say that percentage is 0.005%. Out of a budget of $900 billion, we've got $45 million piled up out in the yard every year so we can set fire to it.

That's the kinda thing is bound to stick in somebody's craw, especially somebody who says to himself, "Hey, maybe I can get me some that money." But that's a slightly different story.

Back to my point, USAmerica Inc is a truly global enterprise, and there's 332 million of us for fuck's sake. You think we can run this joint with a part time skeleton crew? And no nights or weekends?

But let's circle all the way back to that part about "wealth redistribution".

Between 1981 and 2021, $50 trillion migrated from the bottom 90% to the top 1%.

$50,000,000,000,000.00

• The top 10% of US households own over two-thirds of the country's wealth.
• The bottom 50% of households own less than 4% of the nation's wealth.

Talk about the Tyranny Of Large Numbers. Oy.