Dominating the news until recently were countless reports on Elon Musk, concerned with his charge (making government more economical and efficient, his pledge (to root out two trillion dollars’ worth of waste, graft, fraud, and corruption), his actions (the firing of thousands of government employees and the gutting of the United States Agency for International Development), his antics (prancing around waving a chain saw), and his victimization at the hands of vandals and arsonists seeking to destroy his Teslas. Reports on Musk have recently been overshadowed by reports on President Trump’s tariff policies and how they seemingly change day by day to the point where nobody truly knows what they’ll be tomorrow. Nonetheless, it is legitimate to wonder what difference in the long run Musk and DOGE will make. History suggests a discouraging answer: Not much, although with some changes in his tactics, he may do better after all.
Since the 1950s, Republican presidents and other conservative leaders have pledged to make government smaller. But as a brilliant documentary—The War On Government, broadcast on 4/6/25–produced and featuring Washington Post and CNN commentator Fareed Zakaria makes clear, their efforts came to naught. Each Republican president who pledged to reduce the size of government nonetheless left office with a government bigger and more costly then when he launched his administration. For example:
- President Eisenhower preserved the main New Deal Program, Social Security;
- President Nixon created both the Environmental Protection Agency and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration while failing to make headway in eliminating New Deal and Great Society Programs; and
- President Reagan presided over the net addition of 300,000 employees to the federal workforce and a 70% increase in federal spending.
So why did these presidents fail to keep their promises to cut the size of government? And why did Ronald Reagan’s Grace Commission (named for its leader, industrialist Peter Grace), Bill Clinton’s Reinventing Government initiative, or the efforts of Newt Gingrich or the Tea Party movement fail to achieve significant or lasting results? And why will Elon Musk and DOGE probably fail as well? Simple: Most. Americans. Don’t. Want. Spending. Cuts.
Social Security is not only the biggest spending program, it is also one of the most popular programs as well. Nobody likes paying payroll taxes to fund the program, but everyone loves getting money from the government, and for millions of recipients, Social Security payments constitute most of their post-retirement income. Same with Medicare and Medicaid: Too many millions of people are too dependent on these programs. So our senators and representatives know that there’s no better way for them to commit political suicide than to suggest significant cuts in their funding. It’s no coincidence that the only major party nominee for president, Senator Barry Goldwater in 1964, to argue for the abolition of mandatory Social Security lost his bid for the White House in one of the most overwhelming landslides in American history.
And much the same can be said for defense spending as well. Each state, and most of the congressional districts, have either military bases or facilities for weapons production. Whatever the strategic value of bases or weapons, they bring in money and jobs. No senator or congressman will support reductions in the federal funds flowing in to enrich his or her constituents. Efforts to make significant cuts in defense programs will fail as surely as will efforts to cut back on Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid which, together with interest on the national debt constitute about 85% of federal spending.
The only programs in which significant cuts can be made are those which are small and unpopular, such as the foreign aid programs run by USAID. And some of the programs discovered by Musk are indeed too silly to keep: Financing an Iraqi version of Sesame Street? Or an Irish opera glorifying the transgendered? Not with my tax dollars! But foreign aid constitutes only $40 billion—less than 1%–of federal spending, and is so unpopular that no member of Congress will lose votes by advocating its reduction or elimination. It’s noteworthy that the gutting of USAID programs is really the only permanent triumph Elon Musk is likely to achieve.
So, realistically, is there really anything Elon Musk, or DOGE, or any other would-be government-cutter can actually accomplish? Maybe. In an enterprise as large and costly as the federal government there are no doubt instances of waste, fraud, graft, and corruption waiting to be discovered. In an earlier column I discussed how the Government Accountability Office and other federal agencies were uncovering spending abuses in in government programs through patient research and documentation. Elon Musk might yet achieve lasting success by emulating their efforts. But he should drop the dancing and prancing, and trade in his chainsaw for a scalpel. Destroying most programs will be most unpopular, but trimming them to make them more cost-effective will be most welcome to the public—especially the voting public.
Malcolm L. Cross has lived in Stephenville since 1987 and taught politics and government at Tarleton for 36 years, retiring in 2023. His political and civic activities include service on the Stephenville City Council (2000-2014) and on the Erath County Republican Executive Committee (1990-2024). He was Mayor pro-tem of Stephenville from 2008 to 2014. He has served on the Board of Directors of the Stephenville
Economic Development Authority since 2018 and as chair of the Erath County Appraisal District’s Appraisal Review Board since 2015. He is also a member of the Stephenville Rotary Club, the Board of Vestry of St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, and the Executive Committee of the Boy Scouts’ Pecan Valley District. Views expressed in this column are his and do not reflect those of The Flash as a whole.
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