DOGE stands for the Department of Government Efficiency, a creation of President-elect Trump.
This five-part series describes the DOGE and its relationship to the laws of political chaos, a brief history of the predecessors to DOGE, the long-overdue need to implement the hard work done by prior DOGE’s, a recognition that real reform will require devolving many federal domestic powers to the states; and dealing with a pending, nation-shaping lawsuit that will determine President Trump’s seriousness about shrinking the federal government.
DOGE aims to revolutionize the federal government’s efficiency and size. Imagine DOGE as a Rubik’s Cube, with government departments and regulations as its squares. Trump has convinced two of the brightest minds, Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy (“M&R”), to get all the same colors on the same sides. Yet, the various predecessors of DOGE have littered Washington with many great expectations and recommendations that remain as dashed dreams.
So, what is this DOGE? It is easier to state what it is not. It is not an agency of the federal government or a federal advisory committee. So far, it lacks staff or access to government resources. It was not established by Executive Order. DOGE appears to be a government-approved, private-sector group that advises the Office of Management and Budget on driving waste, fraud, and abuse (“WFA”) out of government. It will function as a government-approved lobbying organization that recommends restructuring the government.
DOGE is short-lived, expiring on July 4, 2026. What happens in between is anyone’s guess. The only public information is that Musk is recruiting only “super high-IQ small-government revolutionaries” who must pay X a subscriber fee for the right to apply for a job that pays zero. This job description appears to be code for hiring young Wall Street investment bankers and lawyers whose firms will pay them to work on DOGE to protect their interests.
The pressure will be on the “M” part of M&R to perform a miracle. Musk owns Space X, a space exploration company that is literally NASA’s recuse mission. Musk can send a rocket to a space station and return it to Earth by perfectly parking it in the confines of its launchpad.
Musk can accurately calculate trajectories and outcomes in space travel by following the laws of physics and mathematics. In government reform, however, M&R will quickly discover that the government operates under the chaos theory.
The chaos theory is the foundation of congressional action. The chaos theory explains the behavior of dynamic systems susceptible to initial conditions. While tiny errors between measurements taken closely in time do not make a significant difference, these minor errors between the first and last measurements over a longer period can be so substantial as to prevent an accurate forecast of anticipated behavior. Such a massive miscalculation is explained as the “Butterfly effect,” in which a butterfly flaps its wings in one location, and all the insignificant changes in the winds over long distances cause the formation of a hurricane half a world away.
For “M” and his “high-IQ” revolutionaries to succeed, they must deal with Congress, one of the planet’s most chaotic but essential institutions. M&R will not be able to calculate a starting point since every member of Congress is a potential measurement disruptor. Moreover, the non-paid helpers will recommend changes that simultaneously eliminate the ‘legal privileges’ given to many citizens while leaving the privileges of others intact. This disparity of treatment will multiply the uncertainty of its success. Dealing with the interplay of political, social, cultural, and economic forces is a matter of common sense and negotiating skills, not IQ.
The disconnect between common sense and a super-high IQ raises the question of how successfully DOGE can navigate chaos. It will be a real test of genius vs. chaos.
The essence of political chaos. Any chance of an outcome that benefits the nation must start with the essence of political chaos. Members of Congress represent constituents; as such, they do not hold power as individuals; they hold power as representatives of the people and trustees of the Constitution. The DOGE revolutionaries represent a cause.
Let’s face it: For presidents who want to spend more money than they have or cut taxes to benefit parts of society, the universal “pay-for” is reducing WFA in government. Presidents utter those words instead of “abracadabra” to produce the illusion that they have special knowledge to make the impossible happen.
Focusing on WFA distracts the attention of presidents and Congress from the real issue. Yes, the federal government is too big and powerful and is mismanaged. The fundamental question is, who should reform it under our Constitution? The U.S. legal system comprises over 3000 separate criminal offenses in 53 titles of the U.S. Code, 23,000 pages of federal law, over 215,000 regulations, hundreds of millions of words, and an incomprehensible 7.7-million-word revenue-raising system. Beyond complexity, political chaos is made more unstable as Presidents regularly superimpose their demands over the intent of Congress by issuing hundreds of Executive Orders and twisting regulations beyond what Congress intended. The federal government is in a constant state of chaos.
Political chaos, however, allows the elite to persuade the government to grant them privileges not given to all. It is impossible to eliminate the chaos since every change produces more change. The clearest example of privilege is the federal tax code, a lobbyist-created money laundering scheme. My articles have argued for a return to the 1913 four-page Form 1040 for years. It taxed all income the same in the same income range with very few deductions. While it is the same for everyone, it is utterly abhorrent to the elite since their privileges would be eliminated.
So, what reform can DOGE propose that could become law? It depends on how it proceeds. If M&R acts as corporate chieftains barking pronouncements at the masses or as lobbyists for business interests, reform will fail miserably. To succeed in reform, DOGE must persuade Congress and a nation 80% distrustful of the federal government that their recommendations will produce a level playing field.
First, M&R and President Trump must set their guiding principles for the reform effort. The principles must be more than mouthing “efficiency” and “transparency” on X. Are they deficit reduction, tax fairness, regulatory relief, shrinking government, a return to the free market, or federal workforce reduction? Or all of the above and more? How will the DOGE make its decisions to achieve its goals? How will it measure success? How will it listen to the public? Most importantly, will its decision-making include Congress, a co-equal branch of government with the constitutional responsibility for raising and spending money and legislating? Or will the DOGE try to persuade President Trump to wrest control from Congress by impounding appropriated funds and jamming several Executive reorganizations through Congress?
Yes, working with Congress and being open to citizen comments is an excruciating process that will be utterly boring to the “high-IQ” revolutionaries. President Trump should not waste the time of M&R and the “high-IQ” geniuses to do another government audit that identifies WFA. Many WFA audits have been done, the reports rendered, and an enforcement structure is in place. If President Trump truly wants WFA reform, he should immediately implement the many excellent reports filed by previous commissions, GAO, CBO, and Inspector Generals over the years. A rapid implementation effort could save taxpayers tens of billions, perhaps hundreds of billions, but these WFA efforts will only make a small dent in the national debt. The highly respected Peterson Institute noted, “Curbing waste, fraud, and abuse sound[s] great but would not produce very significant savings.”
The new Republican majority (White House and Congress) must think more deeply than WFA audits, firing civil servants, and shrinking agencies. A substantive restructuring of the federal government will require devolving many of the federal domestic powers to the states, the creation of a simple and fair income tax, and the return of the tens of millions of acres of unappropriated western lands it forced the states to relinquish as the price of admission to the union. These unappropriated lands give the federal government unreasonable control over the economies of many western states. These changes will allow the federal government to focus on its essential responsibilities—national defense, international commerce, and the economy.
If President Trump sincerely wants a smaller federal government, he should work with the Republican Congress to reestablish genuine federalism in the U.S. Otherwise, DOGE is only entertainment to distract distract citizens as it accumulates more power in the presidency.
Next, Part II: A brief history of DOGE’s predecessors.
William L. Kovacs, author of Devolution of Power: Rolling Back the Federal State to Preserve the Republic. It received 5 stars from Readers’ Favorite. His previous book, Reform the Kakistocracy, received the 2021 Independent Press Award for Political/Social Change. He served as senior vice president for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and chief counsel to a congressional committee. He can be contacted at wlk@ReformTheKakistocracy.com
Meta description: DOGE is Trump’s Dept. of Government Efficiency. What happens to its best laid plans to eliminate federal waste, fraud & abuse when it meets Washinton chaos?
