If liberals are howling this much over DOGE, Trump and Musk must be doing good work | Opinion

An old World War II-era bomber pilot axiom is useful in moments of significant political rift: “If you’re taking a lot of flak, you must be over the target.”

If the target is government waste and fraud, President Donald Trump and Elon Musk are the DOGE pilots hearing the whiz of anti-aircraft fire from factions mysteriously opposed to their mission, favored by majorities of voters for generations.

Pollster Frank Luntz has been analyzing the language of political campaigns for decades, revealing one phrase that earns approval across a wide spectrum of American ideology: “wasteful Washington spending.” Activism on most issues divides the nation into similarly sized groups. But Republicans, independents and a fair number of Democratic voters have long said yes if asked whether government is too large and spends too much.

So why the sudden revulsion now that an effort has finally arisen to solve such a widely identified problem?

First, the history. Politicians of both parties have long promised to roll up their sleeves and plow through the bloat in an American government that has ballooned since President Franklin D. Roosevelt tried to spend us out of a depression. I recall a State of the Union address featuring a president pledging to rein in our profligate trend: “We know big government does not have all the answers. We know there’s not a program for every problem. We have work to give the American people a smaller, less bureaucratic government in Washington. And we have to give the American people one that lives within its means.”

That was not from Trump’s first term. It was not Ronald Reagan from the 1980s. It was Bill Clinton in 1996. The Democratic party no longer cultivates such instincts among its elected leaders, even though many of its voters would nod in approval today as they did a generation ago.

Which leads to the source of the wails of protest as DOGE draws a bead on countless examples of government excess: The shrieks emanate from the halls of entrenched power in the Democratic Party and from its amen chorus across the media landscape.

The shrill laments are of a volume one might expect as an asteroid hurtles toward earth. I don’t recall these voices generating nearly as much angst when countless lives were wrecked by COVID lockdowns or when Americans are endangered by the ravages of illegal immigration. This ultra-selective alarm does, however, recognize an imminent collision. A Trump administration that has taken up virtually every conservative cause except spending has now heard that epiphany as well, aiming its battering ram at the entire sweeping labyrinth of government.

The singular intensity of the pushback reveals the genuine value of the DOGE crusade, mere days into its history. While Trump critics will recoil at constitutionalist Supreme Court justices, stronger borders and the death of the Green New Deal, those are specific battles that seem to pale against the broad panic of realization that the very foundations of expansionist, collectivist government may be about to crumble.

The reins of this revolution are in two sets of curious hands: a president whose varying passions have generally not included serious spending reductions and a private-sector icon who was an outright darling of the left until he committed the sin of supporting that president.

Liberals have historically liked space exploration, but SpaceX must now be pilloried because Musk runs it. They have been vigorous voices in the landscape of Twitter (now X), but that platform must now be vilified since Musk removed its muzzles on conservative speech. And while Democrats will continue to prod Americans toward electric vehicles, they must now boycott Teslas because he makes them.

Such are the contortions of political desperation. Musk is absorbing the lion’s share of this laughably inept moment of outrage, replete with its silly protest songs and adolescent signs (“You can’t spell ‘felon’ without ‘Elon’ ”). This serves to actually spare Trump from what would otherwise be waves of derision aimed solely at him.

There is bad news for haters pining for Trump’s large ego to bristle at Musk’s growing share of conservative appreciation: In Musk, he has found a kindred spirit, equally fond of touting his own brand. Each man realizes that the other could play a major role in establishing eternal credit for finally putting a tourniquet on the historic bleeding of the American taxpayer.

Over the years, I have opened the occasional speaking engagement with a unifying joke about the real difference between our two parties: “They’re both going to grow the government,” I would explain, “but the Republicans will tell you they feel terrible about it.”

Looks like I need new material.

Mark Davis hosts a morning radio show in Dallas-Fort Worth on 660-AM and at 660amtheanswer.com. Follow him on X: @markdavis.

This story was originally published February 21, 2025 at 3:25 AM with the headline "If liberals are howling this much over DOGE, Trump and Musk must be doing good work | Opinion."