Without accountability
The billionaire tech magnate has never been elected to office or been confirmed by the Senate for a high-level government job, but in the span of a few days, Musk has still gained access to sensitive federal data through his position as head of President Donald Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency project, or DOGE, to push a far-reaching agenda and potentially spark a constitutional crisis.
Musk has embraced Silicon Valley’s most notorious instincts to “move fast and break things” in a lightning battle to muscle into the computer systems and power structures of federal agencies.
But the government of a large powerful country isn’t Silicon Valley. We don’t actually want things broken.
With a cadre of engineers as young as 19 years old, and with the encouragement of Trump, Musk has demanded and been given access to sensitive government databases and the Treasury Department’s payment system with an unprecedented series of bureaucratic maneuvers.
There are deep concerns among many Democrats and some Republicans that Musk — and his staff members who are not government workers and are not bound by the same ethics and rules that apply to federal workers — are acting in secret, without accountability and potentially against the law in the Trump administration’s effort to shrink the federal government.
Cool about the deep concern, but how about doing something?
Many Democrats — and even some Republicans — say the attempted unilateral remake of the federal government is unlawful, as Trump and Musk have shoved aside not only career civil servants but also the authority of Congress itself.
“It’s a potential constitutional crisis,” said Brian Riedl, a former Senate Republican staff member who is now a senior fellow at the conservative Manhattan Institute. In a phone interview, he said he was concerned that Musk’s power is going unchecked.
“Someone with as much power as Elon Musk has should be Senate-confirmed,” he said. “There needs to be some accountability to Congress and the voters.”
So do something.
Musk has been using as his primary example of suspected government waste a dubious claim that $50 million of taxpayer money went to pay for condoms sent to the Gaza Strip. The Associated Press reported last week that there was no evidence for the claim.
And he has acted largely in secret, withholding not only the names of newly hired government officials who are helping him make decisions, but also the details of the decisions themselves and the supposed legal authority under which he is operating. On Monday, after people began posting the names of DOGE employees online, Musk accused them of breaking the law.
Classic reverse victim and offender.
No one should have as much power as Musk is claiming to have. Legally, he doesn’t have that power. Practically, he does. And it’s exactly the opposite of a democracy, or a republic, or a democratic republic. The Constitution was written to prevent any one individual from having so much power (that didn’t stop the Federalists from trying to seize it, but that never happened).
Of course Trump and Musk guys are not acting alone; they have supporters, followers, henchmen, fixers, lackeys etc. The same with the tyrants and dictators of the past. Without these auxiliaries, they would be powerless. But to the extent that their wishes and desires are acted upon or fulfilled, their singular visions and goals are being carried out, with little to no input from others. We’re now in “It’s aGood Life” territory. Without someone saying “No”, without some sufficiently powerful countervailing force, the only limits they have (as long as their money and/or influence last) are material, physical ones, and they don’t even recognize those. God knows they don’t have any moral or ethical bounds, otherwise they wouldn’t do most of what they’re doing.
It’s too bad that the proposal to officially name our current epoch the Anthropocene was defeated, because someone’s going to need a term for this age of disaster. What it’s called might not be our choice; history is written by the victors, and right now it doesn’t look it’s going to be us.
Forget failed states; we are a failed species.