A worker at the General Services Administration told colleagues in a Slack message Tuesday that they have resigned in protest after Elon Musk ally Thomas Shedd requested “admin/root access to all components of the Notify.gov system,” which is a government system used to send mass text messages to the public that contains information the worker said is highly sensitive and would give Shedd unilateral, private access to the personal data of members of the public.
Shedd is a former Tesla engineer who now runs Technology Transformation Services (TTS), a group of coders and software engineers within the GSA, who is closely allied with Elon Musk and DOGE. Notify.gov contains not just the phone numbers of everyday people but also information about whether they participate in government programs such as Medicaid, which is based on a person's financial situation. In recent days, Musk has become obsessed with the idea of "fraud" in Medicaid, Medicare, and Social Security, and in identifying those he suspects are committing fraud.
In 1987, after serving in the U.S. Navy and becoming a law firm partner, he co-founded Columbia Hospital Corporation. Columbia later merged with another corporation to form Columbia/HCA, which eventually became the nation's largest for-profit health care company.[7] Scott was pressured to resign as chief executive of Columbia/HCA in 1997. During his tenure as chief executive, the company defrauded Medicare, Medicaid, and other federal programs. The U.S. Department of Justice won 14 felony convictions against the company, which was fined $1.7 billion in what was at the time the largest healthcare fraud settlement in U.S. history.[8][9] Following his departure from Columbia/HCA, Scott became a venture capitalist and pursued other business interests.
Re: The Egocentric Eccentric Exploits of Elon
Posted: Wed Feb 19, 2025 12:55 pm
by 88Commanders00
Elon wants to give some of his so called savings to taxpayers.
Think the GOP would be against that as they want to use any savings to pay for tax cuts.
Some hope to use that money towards paying off debt.
If there are any real savings, it should go paying off debt and a small stimulus to taxpayers.
Re: The Egocentric Eccentric Exploits of Elon
Posted: Wed Feb 19, 2025 1:39 pm
by The Evil Genius
Lol paying off debt. There hasn't been a Republican President since Calvin Coolidge that left with less debt than he came in with.
The government isn't and never has been a business. It shouldn't be thought of or treated like one either. It's sole function is to provide for the people. Whether that's safety, security, social programs, et al.
Anyone care to guess what debt change % Trump added in his first term?
40.43%.
Biden? 24.75%
The 2 term Presidents before him...
Obama? 69.98%
Dubya? 105.08%
Clinton? 31.64%
Reagan? 186.36%
According to this reporting, confirmed by multiple sources, it turns out musk's claim of doge "already saving 66 billion dollars" is actually about 8.6 billion and that's before full verification and without full and very relevant context needed to verify any claim of any amount.
The doge douche tech bros "move fast and break things" approach that Elon cherishes are gutting things without any real understanding of how in many cases they will cost taxpayer money in dealing with various consequences resulting from their cutting.
We all want waste and corruption in expenditures eliminated and overinflated bureaucracy deflated.
And I like the idea of doing it aggressively and making it very public, something neither party has done yet.
But I also want it done competently, intelligently, fairly (no demographic based biases), honestly ( no grifting), and with compete detailed transparency.
According to this reporting, confirmed by multiple sources, it turns out musk's claim of doge "already saving 66 billion dollars" is actually about 8.6 billion and that's before full verification and without full and very relevant context needed to verify any claim of any amount.
The doge douche tech bros "move fast and break things" approach that Elon cherishes are gutting things without any real understanding of how in many cases they will cost taxpayer money in dealing with various consequences resulting from their cutting.
We all want waste and corruption in expenditures eliminated and overinflated bureaucracy deflated.
And I like the idea of doing it aggressively and making it very public, something neither party has done yet.
But I also want it done competently, intelligently, fairly (no demographic based biases), honestly ( no grifting), and with compete detailed transparency.
The Department of Government Efficiency, the federal cost-cutting initiative championed by Elon Musk, published on Monday a list of government contracts it has canceled, together amounting to about $16 billion in savings itemized on a new “wall of receipts” on its website.
Almost half of those line-item savings could be attributed to a single $8 billion contract for the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. But the DOGE list vastly overstated the actual value of that contract. A closer scrutiny of a federal database shows that a recent version of the contract was for $8 million, not $8 billion. A larger total savings number published on the site, $55 billion, lacked specific documentation.
