ThunderHorse
Verified Military
Balanced Budget amendment, why do these departments spend past their appropriations? Turn the money off.
Why still on Christmas Recess?
Why still on Christmas Recess?
The Trump Presidency 2.0
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Richard Jewell wasn't promoted to the CIA after his event, but you're right, we shall see.
I can't tell from catching up on the thread- do you guys want the government open or not?
The Dems getting absolutely zero for the longest shut down in history is hilarious. We are not a serious country in any sense.
I think everyone here that works for the gov would love to pay their mortgage.
Devildoc
Verified Military
Well, of course. But.... We've seen who is essential and who isn't. The folks who haven't been essential, who haven't been missed, might need to find a different job.
I am aware of the plank in my own eye. My job could get folded into another and my position eliminated in another realignment.
You've gathered all of that in the last 6 weeks?
We knew so beforehand, but the last 6 weeks helped verify those hypotheses.
Remember this when it comes time to vote in the midterms. I'd like you to be able to pay your mortgage, too. One of our political parties doesn't care.
Devildoc
Verified Military
No, over 35 years of dealing with the feds in various capacities.
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oddly enough - if the shutdown identified "X" number of people that aren't needed - you can bet your sweet asses that the 14's and 15's and SES's that do the paperwork to rewrite PD's so that 3 people can start doing the work of five...
...none of these half wit motherfuckers will EVER suggest that maybe the three people doing the work of five people dont need four fucking supervisors
...but I'll be a monkeys mother fucking uncle if anybody eliminates a single 14-15-SES billet before they put two or three 11-12-13 folks on the street
...none of these half wit motherfuckers will EVER suggest that maybe the three people doing the work of five people dont need four fucking supervisors
...but I'll be a monkeys mother fucking uncle if anybody eliminates a single 14-15-SES billet before they put two or three 11-12-13 folks on the street
Kraut783
SOF Support
Promoted to the CIA? naw, she just left her PD job and got another job in security...a step down in my opinion.
Devildoc
Verified Military
I have mixed opinions about it. I know a guy who left a local police department after some years and got a $20,000 year raise to go into corporate security. In any case, she was low-hanging fruit.
Have we? As I posted elsewhere a lot of folks are working without pay, including security guards. A lot of folks furloughed who aren't deemed "essential" have work to do. Just because someone was furloughed and the gov kept working doesn't mean they aren't necessary. My entire cybersecurity approval chain is sitting at home. I guess because they were furloughed and the system kept working we don't need those folks? Those are our policy makers. We're still generating work, but the people at home can't respond or do anything.
ETA: If your drain is clogged, but you don't immediately see the water backing up, you'll assume your drain is G2G. That's what we're doing, we're pouring water into a clogged drain, it just hasn't backed up into the sink.
This is where people need to look. Break up the good old boy clubs.
Devildoc
Verified Military
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I've been working for free this entire time and I've been told quite a few times - all the way back to COVID that I'm "not essential"
...which, coincidentally, back then I had to come in a couple times a week
...because I wasn't essential enough to have a "travel kit"
I'm just "happy to have a job in this economy"
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Not at all, but the argument I keep seeing here and elsewhere is the government is working, so do we need those furloughed people? Like my drain addition above, it isn't working like we think.
No, the gov needs an overhaul, but minus a few instances like USAID, I don't think we've done the best job eliminating waste. We went after numbers and declared victory based on a Vietnam-esque body count. We have crippled ourselves in some areas and won't see that payout for a few more years, but it will happen.
It isn't just about people, it is about processes. We haven't changed the processes but we're cutting people. hat's shortsighted and quite stupid if we're being honest. I could go into my department right now and chop 50-60% if folks upstream of us at DoN and DoW would make some policy changes. Some of our processes are just broken and everyone's worried about people, but we don't need as many people if we changed HOW we do business.
And that's where all of this is falling short: we aren't cutting the right people and we haven't changed how we do business. In some cases we've made it harder since Trump took office. It doesn't make sense.
Sure.
ThunderHorse
Verified Military
Oh they got stuff out of it, they used it as a way to leverage their candidates in an election and paint Republicans as the big bad wolf and Republicans didn't do enough "we just need 5 votes" to paint these assholes into a corner. It didn't go on long enough to hurt them.
You have to ask how many people not being paid while going to work are actually working on excepted tasks, and nothing else. If you're at work and not working those items then it's an ADA. The DoW put that list out and if the individual's haven't seen it then that's on the leadership.
And to AWP's point, if you get rid of a bunch of civilians, you will have to hire contractors. For the most part, the contractor is responsible for asses in seats, which aren't the best and brightest, so you lose on talent somewhere. It'll cost more too.
Just because the system didn't collapse due to the furlough does not make it a success. I'm so tired of the get rid of everyone mentality
Devildoc
Verified Military
If you inferred "get rid of everyone mentality" from me, you missed my points by about a billion miles
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Florida173
SOF Support
Interesting. My experience is that the civilians have mostly been the ones lacking any talent. Generally doing whatever minimum time required to get promoted out. The ones that are actually good head to the private sector. There was a great IG report across all agencies just on this problem with the attrition rates among STEM focused fields.
Whereas the contractors are usually the only actual continuity on any teams. If a contractor doesn't perform, he gets removed. Behind any poorly performing contractors is probably an even worse COR/COTR.
I've seen the spectrum of good and bad talent. Unfortunately good civilian talent doesn't always last before they get hit with the Peter Principle.
Regarding the shutdown. The excepted staffers working as branch chiefs have been doing an amazing job rotating people to get them working if possible where i work. Most of us contractors' companies are working at risk. The guidelines for what appropriate excepted work and not excepted work is pretty well spelled out for us, but our contracting officer is actually a good one.
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Devildoc
Verified Military
I will put this to bed once and for all (hopefully).
A couple months ago we were discussing how many FOGOs we had and the need to get rid of some. I don't recall anyone particularly concerned about whether they could pay their mortgage or where their next meal was coming from if they got RIF'd. When DOGE did its thing I saw a lot of applauding and not a lot of pearl-clutching because they were largely trying to get rid of government bloat, redundancy, and inefficiency.
I am sure, I am certain, I am 100% confident, that anyone who has spent more than about 45 seconds around the military has seen civilian employees or contractors who are both indispensable as well as worthless. I have seen the same; some punching far above their weight and are value-added, and obligate mouth-breathers whose sole job was to convert oxygen. My own very recent experience with the latter is with a former special operator-now contractor at SOCOM who was hired to design curriculum but has no education experience in curriculum design nor evaluation, who gave me the deer in the headlights look when I asked him about Bloom's taxonomy.
I am not nor have I ever advocated throwing the baby out with the bathwater, proposing a binary none-or-all philosophy.
I do think 5 or 6 weeks or whatever have highlighted who is working, and who is not, who is indispensable and who is not, and if 'they' use that to determine how to cull the heard to cut inefficiency, I am OK with that.
I also think this has shown us who the NIMBYists are: Not In My Back Yard, the folks who are good to go with RIFfing so long as it isn't in their agencies. You can't have it both ways.
A couple months ago we were discussing how many FOGOs we had and the need to get rid of some. I don't recall anyone particularly concerned about whether they could pay their mortgage or where their next meal was coming from if they got RIF'd. When DOGE did its thing I saw a lot of applauding and not a lot of pearl-clutching because they were largely trying to get rid of government bloat, redundancy, and inefficiency.
I am sure, I am certain, I am 100% confident, that anyone who has spent more than about 45 seconds around the military has seen civilian employees or contractors who are both indispensable as well as worthless. I have seen the same; some punching far above their weight and are value-added, and obligate mouth-breathers whose sole job was to convert oxygen. My own very recent experience with the latter is with a former special operator-now contractor at SOCOM who was hired to design curriculum but has no education experience in curriculum design nor evaluation, who gave me the deer in the headlights look when I asked him about Bloom's taxonomy.
I am not nor have I ever advocated throwing the baby out with the bathwater, proposing a binary none-or-all philosophy.
I do think 5 or 6 weeks or whatever have highlighted who is working, and who is not, who is indispensable and who is not, and if 'they' use that to determine how to cull the heard to cut inefficiency, I am OK with that.
I also think this has shown us who the NIMBYists are: Not In My Back Yard, the folks who are good to go with RIFfing so long as it isn't in their agencies. You can't have it both ways.
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