site banner
PaperclipPerfector  5mo ago (text post)   36098 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of March 3, 2025

This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.

Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.

We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:

  • Shaming.

  • Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.

  • Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.

  • Recruiting for a cause.

  • Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.

In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:

  • Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.

  • Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.

  • Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.

  • Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.

On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.

7
Top Bottom Old Controversial Comments
Jump in the discussion.

No email address required.

Has Musk's DOGE Capacity to Cut Been Reined In By Trump?

Less importantly- did a prediction from a AAQC from last month play out already?

Last month (February 2025- it feels so long already), Elon Musk made the news and Motte discussion when he sent out an Office of Personnel Management (OPM) email where it directed employees respond back with 5 bullet points on what they did in the last week. Implicit in the demand was an 'or else' if they did not, or if their answers were unsatisfactory.

This caused what I believe is technically terms a 'kerfuffle,' and confusion across the US Federal Bureaucracy, which subsided (a bit) when institutional leaders provided their own guidance clarifying who did need to respond, and how. For example, the Secretary of Defense issued two rounds of guidance- first telling DOD civilians to not respond, and then later giving guidance on how to.

During the Motte discussions on it, I opined that I thought it might have been Musk overplaying his hand rather than 5D chess, since it started to establish boundaries on what Musk could, and could not, do without the support of the Secretaries and institutional heads that make up the rest of Trump's Cabinet.

Bottom line- I think this OPM email event has resulted in Musk undercutting himself and DOGE for the foreseeable future, and greatly reined in its potential to rein in agencies without the backing of those agencies own leaders.

Well, if a new New York Times article from yesterday is to be believed, that may have been what happened last Thursday- though the way the NYT tells it is emphasizing a lot more about fireworks between Musk and Secretary of State Rubio, who as I noted in a post on Dual Hatting government positions is the one who 'really' has been taking apart USAID.

(Yes, trusting the NYT is a bar to clear... but there is a reason why when people within the US government want to air dirty laundry that would be embarrassing to Republicans, they'd often like to go there first.)

Marco Rubio was incensed. Here he was in the Cabinet Room of the White House, the secretary of state, seated beside the president and listening to a litany of attacks from the richest man in the world.

Seated diagonally opposite, across the elliptical mahogany table, Elon Musk was letting Mr. Rubio have it, accusing him of failing to slash his staff.

You have fired “nobody,” Mr. Musk told Mr. Rubio, then scornfully added that perhaps the only person he had fired was a staff member from Mr. Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency.

Mr. Rubio had been privately furious with Mr. Musk for weeks, ever since his team effectively shuttered an entire agency that was supposedly under Mr. Rubio’s control: the United States Agency for International Development. But, in the extraordinary cabinet meeting on Thursday in front of President Trump and around 20 others — details of which have not been reported before — Mr. Rubio got his grievances off his chest.

Mr. Musk was not being truthful, Mr. Rubio said. What about the more than 1,500 State Department officials who took early retirement in buyouts? Didn’t they count as layoffs? He asked, sarcastically, whether Mr. Musk wanted him to rehire all those people just so he could make a show of firing them again. Then he laid out his detailed plans for reorganizing the State Department.

Mr. Musk was unimpressed. He told Mr. Rubio he was “good on TV,” with the clear subtext being that he was not good for much else. Throughout all of this, the president sat back in his chair, arms folded, as if he were watching a tennis match.

And how did Trump (allegedly) respond?

After the argument dragged on for an uncomfortable time, Mr. Trump finally intervened to defend Mr. Rubio as doing a “great job.” Mr. Rubio has a lot to deal with, the president said. He is very busy, he is always traveling and on TV, and he has an agency to run. So everyone just needs to work together.

The meeting was a potential turning point after the frenetic first weeks of Mr. Trump’s second term. It yielded the first significant indication that Mr. Trump was willing to put some limits on Mr. Musk, whose efforts have become the subject of several lawsuits and prompted concerns from Republican lawmakers, some of whom have complained directly to the president.

Cabinet officials almost uniformly like the concept of what Mr. Musk set out to do — reducing waste, fraud and abuse in government — but have been frustrated by the chain saw approach to upending the government and the lack of consistent coordination.

Thursday’s meeting, which was abruptly scheduled on Wednesday evening, was a sign that Mr. Trump was mindful of the growing complaints. He tried to offer each side something by praising both Mr. Musk and his cabinet secretaries. (At least one, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, who has had tense encounters related to Mr. Musk’s team, was not present.) The president made clear he still supported the mission of the Musk initiative. But now was the time, he said, to be a bit more refined in its approach.

From now on, he said, the secretaries would be in charge; the Musk team would only advise.

Now, these are claims. But there are some claims that may (or may not) bolster your view of the article's claims, if you want to verify them yourself.

In a post on social media after the meeting, Mr. Trump said the next phase of his plan to cut the federal work force would be conducted with a “scalpel” rather than a “hatchet” — a clear reference to Mr. Musk’s scorched-earth approach.

Here's a link to an Axios article covering that.

Mr. Musk, who wore a suit and tie to Thursday’s meeting instead of his usual T-shirt after Mr. Trump publicly ribbed him about his sloppy appearance, defended himself by saying that he had three companies with a market cap of tens of billions of dollars, and that his results spoke for themselves.

This would be more telling, given Musk's signature style to date, but I'll admit I haven't gone diving for image evidence. I haven't seen any counter-claims that that suit-claim is false as a disprooof against these stories, however.

The article does not claim that Musk was only at odds with Rubio either.

But he [Musk] was soon clashing with members of the cabinet.

Just moments before the blowup with Mr. Rubio, Mr. Musk and the transportation secretary, Sean Duffy, went back and forth about the state of the Federal Aviation Administration’s equipment for tracking airplanes and what kind of fix was needed. Howard Lutnick, the commerce secretary, jumped in to support Mr. Musk.

Mr. Duffy said the young staff of Mr. Musk’s team was trying to lay off air traffic controllers. What am I supposed to do? Mr. Duffy said. I have multiple plane crashes to deal with now, and your people want me to fire air traffic controllers?

Mr. Musk told Mr. Duffy that his assertion was a “lie.” Mr. Duffy insisted it was not; he had heard it from them directly. Mr. Musk, asking who had been fired, said: Give me their names. Tell me their names.

Mr. Duffy said there were not any names, because he had stopped them from being fired. At another point, Mr. Musk insisted that people hired under diversity, equity and inclusion programs were working in control towers. Mr. Duffy pushed back and Mr. Musk did not add details, but said during the longer back and forth that Mr. Duffy had his phone number and should call him if he had any issues to raise.

Trump did allegedly have a characteristically Trumpian thing to contribute to this point- an expression that I wouldn't actually expect the NYT to be able to invent on its own.

The exchange ended with Mr. Trump telling Mr. Duffy that he had to hire people from M.I.T. as air traffic controllers. These air traffic controllers need to be “geniuses,” he said.

There are a few bits more, but the NYT article concludes-

Most cabinet members did not join the fray. Mr. Musk’s anger directed at Mr. Rubio in particular seemed to catch people in the room by surprise, one person with knowledge of the meeting said. Another person said Mr. Musk’s caustic responses to Mr. Duffy and Mr. Rubio seemed to deter other cabinet members, many of whom have privately complained about the Musk team, from speaking.

But it remains to be seen how long this new arrangement will last.

So. Thoughts.

Is this story true?

I find it plausible enough, though reasonable people may differ and I wouldn't be surprised if some distortions are in. Even setting aside credibility of the NYT as an institution, this is a pretty typical 'leak to the press to air grievances for personal advantage' type of story, and the person who is providing their own information has their own interest, even if the NYT reported what they heard 100% faithfully. It's not the NYT alone that's reporting the story either, for what that's worth.

Part of why I find it plausible is that I have been expecting something along these lines regardless- which might make it a confirmation bias vulnerability, but a bias is not the same as a fallacy. Musk has been making moves, but he has also been making moves against the interest of other secretaries and cabinet members. People taking that to the press should be expected, since Musk has rivals inside the government and not just outside.

Is this outcome expected?

I'd also say yes. The idea that Trump was going to side with Musk over everyone he paid political capital to appoint was about as reasonable as expecting Trump to fire those same people for not going along with DOGE. DOGE was not a blank check for Elon Musk.

I'd also say reining in Musk was also a way for Trump to assert himself in a not-burning-the-bridges fashion. The suit would be one such, as was discussed last week about the Ukraine-Zelensky respect/disrespect theme. Siding with Rubio or Duffy is another. Yes, it stings for Musk... but at the end of the day, Musk has had no formal government power beyond Trump's favor.

At the end of the day, DOGE's only power is the power that is inherent to, and supported by, the Chief Executive. But said Chief Executive also put other people in key positions for his purposes. Trump is always going to prioritize Trump's vision over Musk's, and those Secretaries will stay as long as they advance that, and so while Trump has a role for Musk, it will be on Trump's terms.

What does this mean going forward?

As predicted last month, expect to see DOGE working with and through, not around or over, the Cabinet Secretaries. Expect DOGE to shift from government destabilizer (your employees owe reports to us... or else) to external consultant (DOGE comes in, looks at data, and proposes things that the heads may or may not take up). DOGE will not go away, but it's relationship to agencies, and thus their federal employees, will change.

Elon isn't out, but he may be increasingly sidelined going forward. With the Secretaries being prioritized over DOGE, DOGE- as an institution- may have more visibility and presence than Musk himself. As long as it is the Secretaries who have the agenda-accepting, and thus agenda-setting, power of DOGE, Musk can't force the agenda. If he can't force the agenda, he'll only be present where he and the Secretaries agree he can / should be. And that, in turn, will depend on Musk's relationships... which, unsurprising in a field as full of primo donnas as politics, isn't ideal.

Watch out for a flame out- and encouragements for a flame out. While the articles on this cabinet meeting seem to emphasize that Trump isn't trying to push Elon out, that doesn't mean Elon won't self-combust on his own, or be 'encouraged' to it by hostile media coverage. Whatever you think of Elon's emotional stability on his medical routine, you should expect every disagreement to be a crisis, and every difference a chasm in coverage going forward. Elon's made political enemies on the left, and while he seems aware enough of Trump's political patronage, that doesn't mean he won't lash out if prodded, or even if not. As with many Musk achievements, expect it to be great and glorious and worse all in one.

And that is all. I was just surprised we hadn't covered this story yet here on the Motte, and- while not unexpected- might update some people's views on Trump's strategies as a disruptor, and the value of coming in with a big shock to make later and smaller measures easier to make.

It’s plausible that there was a cabinet meeting where there were opposing views and heated discussion about important matters. Pretty standard stuff in high stakes meetings from what I’ve seen in corporate.

NYT and the rest of the media have been salivating for a wedge between musk and Trump. The media in general tried to make it a “thing” for months. This at least hints at something. And failing Trump-musk fight, a cabinet-musk fight is close enough. I have no doubt the framing and subtext of the NYT story is bullshit.

As predicted last month, expect to see DOGE working with and through, not around or over, the Cabinet Secretaries. Expect DOGE to shift from government destabilizer (your employees owe reports to us... or else) to external consultant (DOGE comes in, looks at data, and proposes things that the heads may or may not take up). DOGE will not go away, but it's relationship to agencies, and thus their federal employees, will change.

This should have happened in the first place, but now its becoming more likely I think DOGE will have less impact on reducing spending going forward. Department budgets are like this entrenched Gordian knot and without a strong disruptor I don't see how they can be moderated.

(Assuming the leak is true, which is a big IF) Marco pushing back on cutting USAID is a case in point. Rubio, seeing USAID under his purview as Sect of State wants control of any cuts. So now you've got one more point of failure in the cost cutting. Marco would cut less than Elon suggests, probably wishing to keep 'soft power' elements and other things that give the State Dept more power or influence.

Department budgets are like this entrenched Gordian knot and without a strong disruptor I don't see how they can be moderated.

Non-defence discretionary spending is the easiest part of the budget to cut, grows slower than the economy over the medium term, and has been successfully cut several times, most recently the Obama-era sequestration.

You don't need DOGE to cut the discretionary budget - you need DOGE to make sure you still have a functional government after you cut the discretionary budget. And the so-called DOGE being led by Elon Musk as a private citizen with the ear of the President is noticeably not doing that. And if you are serious about cutting waste, fraud and abuse, you start with military procurement and Medicare - not with Politico Pro subscriptions and Bloomberg terminals.

I assume Senator Rick Scott will take the lead in fighting Medicare fraud - he has considerable experience of the area, having bilked Medicare for $2 billion as CEO of Columbia/HCA. The leading healthcare expert in Trump's OMB, Don Dempsey, has similarly relevant expertise, having been the head lobbyist for the Medicare Advantage providers who are the worst leeches in the system.

I've come to terms with the fact that "could" actually means "could not" when it precedes "care less," but I think I've yet to come to terms with the fact that "reign" actually means "to restrain or stop, like pulling on the strap for controlling a horse" when it precedes "in."

Shots fired!

And hit. Direct hit.

(Thanks. I've fixed that.)

Isn't that "rein" with no "g"?

Traditionally, yes. But just like how people keep using "could care less" to mean "couldn't care less (because I care so little that it is physically impossible for me to care any less than I already do now)," people keep using "reign in" to mean "rein in." I think "could care less" has become common enough to become a correct version of the phrase, and I think "reign in" is getting there in terms of how common it is, at least in online text.

Oh, that's deeply unfortunate.

I think "could care less" has become common enough to become a correct version of the phrase

No, it's still very much incorrect. People are just depressingly bad at using language properly.

Well, if enough people are bad at using language properly in the exact same way, then I'd argue that it's the language that's not proper, not the people. It's hard to say where the tipping point is and if the tipping point has been reached, though.

In this case, when people are using words to mean the exact opposite of what they actually mean (and doing it with apathy for the correct meaning, which is even worse), I would say I'm not convinced that there will ever be a point where it becomes correct usage, even if everyone on the planet were to use the phrase this way. But I'm also a diehard prescriptivist, so YMMV.

thats_the_joke.avif

The failure-state most people expected from DOGE was that it would mostly be limited to symbolic cuts and focus on PR "wins". If it ever tried to go after important things like the massive elder care apparatus (which comprises something like 2/3rds of federal spending) then people would scream and Trump wouldn't back Musk. I had thought the egos of Trump and Musk destined them to a cataclysmic falling-out at some point, but Hanania has persuaded me that's definitely not guaranteed, and we could Musk with the resiliency of Jared Kushner from Trump's first term.

Still it's looking more and more likely that Musk will have fairly limited power to actually do anything beyond symbolic trivialities, and once the becomes clear I think there's a good chance he'll move on of his own accord.

Probably for the best, given that some of the stuff he did cut like cancer research probably should have been kept.

For example, the Secretary of Defense issued two rounds of guidance- first telling DOD civilians to not respond, and then later giving guidance on how to.

This is pretty emblematic of the USDS' inability to approach problems in a patient and effective manner. It shouldn't be a problem for a government-wide initiative to seek and receive the blessing of the cabinet officials and have them direct their underlings to comply.

Often a moderate amount of attention that is capable of being marshaled with long-time followthrough can be far more effective than massive/bombastic attention that is distracted and can't be extended through time. An avalanche can't carve a canyon all the way to the sea, but a river can.

Has Musk's DOGE Capacity to Cut Been Reigned In By Trump?

I don't know, but I sure hope so.

It's no secret that I'm bearish on Elon, and one of my fears was the Trump admin's credibility being hitched to Musk's. I actually wouldn't mind if he got kicked out, but that won't necessarily be so easy for Trump. During this dustup with Vivek someone said the Red Tribe base will be thrown under the bus, I responded that this doesn't make sense as, much like Zelensky, Vivek has no cards, and sure enough he was shortly ejected. Elon on the other hand has one, and it's a pretty important one - Twitter, so it won't be so easy for Trump to kick him out.

On the other hand, the problem for Elon is that he's not the only one with such cards. Facebook is dead, but Instagram is still going strong, so maybe Zuckerborg will want to cozy up to the administration? Maybe Bezos can hire a few Trump-friendly writers at the Atlantic? So other than Elon self-combusting, he might end up outplayed.

Even setting aside credibility of the NYT as an institution, this is a pretty typical 'leak to the press to air grievances for personal advantage' type of story.

If that's what happened, I'm a bit annoyed. Leak to your friends, not your opposition, you're raising / helping them maintain their profile, when you should be undermining it. During the first term, Trump was reportedly glued to Fox News, couldn't they leak there directly?

If I ever stumble into power, remind me to take you as an advisor.

Ahem: 'Don't.'

First hit is free. Next one will cost you.

[/jk]

Every agency was directed to work on a RIF (layoff) plan. The legally required first step. I think the nature of the rest of the RIFs will say a lot about how much power Musk has. The first few RIFs announced have been structured to prevent the normal process where senior people can displace junior people in positions outside the original scope of the layoffs by making the group everyone doing a function so there's no remaining jobs to fall into. If the new RIFs continue this method of removing people, I think the reports like this are people trying to meme Musk's power away.

What is this place?

This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.

The weekly Culture War threads host the most controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy; if in doubt, post!

Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts. You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.


Why are you called The Motte?

A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently, it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey", originally identified by philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."

On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.


New post guidelines

If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it. A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).

Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.

If in doubt, please post it!


Rules


Recommended Posts And Communities

Recommended Realtime Chats