Mr. President, Bring Us Together

Yes, this blog was and is intended to be non-political. But it is like saying that you never intended to be a fireman when one night you smell smoke and realize that your house is on fire. You call 911, but in the meantime, you grab the fire extinguisher and the garden hose, and yes, you become a fireman. Our intentions are fine, but sometimes crisis dictates our course.

I did muster the courage to write one post-election blog. When I wrote Blow Up Your TV on November 17, I was still hopeful that the US Senate would use their power of “advise and consent” to reject a long list of clearly unqualified nominees for cabinet positions in the new Trump Administration. While Matt Gaetz was dropped from the list, the rest of the clown car has been confirmed, sworn in, and assumed their duties. Fox TV hosts, a world wrestling executive, right wing conspiracists, a Russia and Assad apologist, and an anti-vaxxer, have taken the reins of power (maybe) in the Executive Branch.

The United States Senate utterly failed in their duty to objectively examine and rule on the qualifications of the President’s nominees. Senator John Thune and the Republican Conference can all be charged with dereliction of duty and someday will pay for their transgressions with their seats. I truly believe that. Because, if you put clowns in charge, you eventually wind up with a circus.

The group of newly confirmed leaders of the Executive Branch convened for the first time on Wednesday and as the camera panned around the table, it occurred to me that this is not a cabinet, this is a junk drawer. These pretenders were sitting in the chairs of Jefferson, Adams, Hamilton, Madison, Webster, Acheson, Dulles, Kissinger, Albright, Schultz, Baker, Forestall, Marshall, Gates, Panetta, Mattis, Thompson, Sebelius, Alexander, and Riley.

And who spoke first in the cabinet meeting? Who was standing over the proceedings while everyone else in the room was seated? Call me old fashioned, but who was wearing a goofy hat in total disrespect for where he was and to whom he was speaking? The President? The Vice President? No. The first person to speak was the richest man in the world (measured in dollars), Elon Musk.

The reason I put the parenthetical (maybe) above as regards to the new Secretaries taking the reins of power, is the preemptive, illegal, ill-advised, and utterly insane actions of Elon and his teenage Muskrats who have run roughshod over the federal government since the inauguration. These rodents of revenge have bypassed the chains of command and abolished agencies, stopped funding streams, fired civil servants in good standing, and gained illegal access to sensitive data bases with financial and other personal information about all Americans. All in violation of the law.

Well, you say we voted for these folks to “shake things up.” It’s one thing to put the government in a cocktail shaker. It is far different to indiscriminately destroy institutions and lives.

They have been so indiscriminate in their actions that they have had to reverse embarrassing errors: firing the engineers responsible for nuclear security, the scientists researching the spreading epidemic of bird flu and the Ebola virus, and the VA employees manning the Veterans Suicide Hotline. Not only have they fired thousands of employees, they have questioned the worth of all federal employees. They have said that they are not engaged in “productive” work. They have objectified 2 million fellow-Americans as not worthy of respect.

They were joined by Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, the Speaker of the House’s appointee to the House DOGE Subcommittee, who said these things at a recent hearing:

Those are not real jobs producing federal revenue, by the way. They’re consuming taxpayer dollars. Those jobs are paid for by the American tax people (sic), who work real jobs, earn real income, pay federal taxes and then pay these federal employees. Federal employees do not deserve their jobs. Federal employees do not deserve their paychecks. And these are jobs that can be fired at will.

The first sentence and last sentences are false. The rest is opinion. The congresswoman also neglects to point out that all federal employees pay federal income taxes and without the benefit of high-paid legal counsel, they typically pay more than their fair share.

I apologize to all intelligent readers for quoting MTG, but it sets up my principal thesis.

Everyone knows a federal employee. If you can’t think of one off hand, think of Sonny down at the Five Points Post Office. Great guy with a nice word for every customer. He speaks “down home” to the North Carolinians, pretty good Spanish, and enough Chinese and Korean to greet regulars. I have heard him take the time to explain the options and costs for overseas shipments, always working toward the best deal for the customer. He is someone who I look forward to seeing on my weekly round of errands. He deserves his job. He more than earns his meager paycheck. He deserves our respect.

He is joined by thousands of other Sonnys in your life, at over 400 National Parks, 1,400 Social Security Offices, 26 regional Passport agencies, Customs and Border Patrol offices in every international airport. You might have a friend or a loved one who has raised their right hand and been sworn in as a proud civil servant.

Aside: You might have watched in horror as the Capitol Police protected the lives of the Congress and congressional staff on January 6th and suffered beatings and injury in the line of duty. They are civil servants. They are the civil servants who protect Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene every day.

I was sworn in twice in my 40 year career. Once in a shabby office in the DC headquarters of the Civil Service Commission (since 1978 The Office of Personnel Management), and once in the Indian Treaty Room of the White House when I was sworn into the Senior Executive Service by The Honorable Royce Lamberth, Chief Judge of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia.

And as a reader of this blog. I have told you about the dedicated, non-partisan people of the National Archives who it was my pleasure to call my colleagues for 35 years. They are the kind of people who consider it an honor and a privilege to walk into our headquarters in Washington, our state-of-the-art National Archives at College Park, or any of the regional archives, records centers, and presidential libraries across the country, to preserve and make available the records of our Nation. They work for you every day, and they understand the importance of their mission.

When Elon Musk bypassed the appointed and confirmed heads of federal agencies last week and sent his now infamous email demanding that each federal employee report to him the five things they had accomplished in the previous five days, I thought of two employees of the National Archives. One was the archivist at College Park who helped 100 researchers last week with court cases, book proposals, family history, veterans’ benefits, and military day reports as therapy for a soldier with PTSD. The other was a young conservator working late in one of our brightly lit labs. She was hunched over a microscope and working on just one precious document for the entire week. One curling flake of iron gall ink at a time, she painstakingly re-adheres each letter to the ancient parchment. She skillfully reverses the ravages of time and brings this documentary piece of history back to life for display, analysis, and education of an informed citizenry. Her careful work will last for years to come.

What would the AI algorithms of Elon Musk and his little geniuses say about the mission critical nature of each of these tasks? One hundred researchers, 20 a day, good? One document conservation for an entire week of work, bad? You get the point and the terrifying nature of this cruel process.

As I have fretted over the fate of my old agency and its dedicated colleagues and become increasingly alarmed at the news, I have noticed a trend. (Get ready, you’ll remember my theme is Ride to the Sunshine).

More and more Americans are beginning to say ENOUGH.

The polling is beginning to reflect it. The President’s approval ratings are lower at the one month mark than for any US President in history. A raucous series of town hall meetings in Republican districts have made this first congressional recess a nightmare for some MAGA members of the House. For members too afraid to show their faces, Congressional offices are being picketed. Spontaneous rallies for Ukraine have erupted from Times Square to Main Street.

Perchance Donald Trump can do the impossible. Perchance Donald Trump can awaken a majority of Americans to see that we have common interests in the rule of law, constitutional government, remaining on the side of freedom and democracy around the world, and protecting alliances that have kept Europe safe from Soviet/Russian aggression since WWII.

Maybe, just maybe, the great divider has overreached and become the great uniter.

I keep asking people. I don’t care WHO you voted for. My question is…IS THIS WHAT YOU VOTED FOR?

Did you vote for chaos? Did you vote for cruel treatment of the civil service? Did you vote for indiscriminate firing of people without any view toward performance or mission? Did you vote to abandon Ukraine and take the side of Russia, North Korea, Belarus, and Hungary for the first time in our history? Did you vote to have an unelected billionaire and his youth corps break the laws of our country and literally abolish federal agencies? Did you vote to have the richest man in the world force the richest nation in the world to stop sending medication, food, clothing, and expertise to the poorest nations of the world? Did you vote to have Congress allow their powers to flow to the courts that now literally hold the future of our democracy in their hands?

Is this what you voted for?

And to my friends who held their noses and simply voted for lower taxes, I ask you this question. What luxury could you not afford last year because of your tax rate? What did you have to deprive your family of because your taxes were too high? The high end vehicle that you drive? Your country club membership? Your 2024 vacations? Your second home? What?

As the father of a former elementary school teacher, the father-in-law of a federal agent, a friend of Sonny the mail clerk, Kenny and Crystal the Capitol Police Officers, countless former Archives colleagues, and an advocate for those low-income Americans who rely on federal dollars to give them representation in civil court, I would gladly pay higher taxes.

I witnessed the work of civil servants for 40 years in Washington, DC. While as in all large organizations there are exceptions, the vast majority of the federal work force are hard-working, mission-driven professionals with pride in what they do for the American people.

Now that everyone has been ordered back to the office to perform their daily work, the rush hour in Washington, DC will again extend from 6am until 8pm five days a week. It is one of the longest rush hours in the nation. Why, do you ask? Well, some come early and leave early and others come late and leave late. But most of the civil servants who were my colleagues come early and stay late each day. The manpower and the resources are not nearly enough to do the work. When people have the integrity to complete the mission each day, they do what is necessary for you.

Give them your respect.