Trump: Musk Must Toe A Fine Line

DOGE is no stooge but it ain’t POTUS. As President Trump recently assured, “Elon can’t do – and won’t do – anything without our approval and we’ll give him the approval where appropriate. Where not appropriate, we won’t.” So, where’s the beef?

A recent WSJ article hinted that Trump had hinted during a talk with reporters in the Oval Office “at curbs on Musk’s powers after the billionaire shakes up Washington.” The angst in DC, of course, comes from Mr. Tesla’s bold critiques of runaway government spending on flub dubs & earnest promises to dismantle needless government agencies. Yet, as the President assured, Musk literally has zippo power to actually take any concrete steps, except as No. 47’s muckraking forensic accountant & roving, if glorified, hit man.

One can understand, if not care too much about, the resulting fear among Swamp creatures & their contractual allies over such a business guru who can ferret out corruption as well as foolish spending, especially when they could be accused of playing a role in the run on taxpayers’ money. As the WSJ noted, Mr. Trump’s assurances of closely watching Musk pointedly came “just hours after a Musk-led team effectively shut down” USAID, which Musk has unapologetically called an “evil criminal organization” and other critics are calling a virtual Deep State slush fund. More importantly, however, it was Secretary of State Marco Rubio whom Trump had made acting head of the agency. So, it is Rubio who will carry out any reforms the president, not Musk, deems necessary. While Rubio has also said USAID is “out of control” and guilty of “rank insubordination,” he also notably stopped short of terminating the agency; instead, he assured the Administration would “work closely with Congress” over its future. Wasn’t that how DOGE was billed to work?

Davd Soul