They Thought No One Would Notice, But Elon Just Exposed Washington’s Dirtiest Secret!

The push to cut government waste has begun, and Washington isn’t happy about it. The newly formed Department of Government Efficiency is making waves by attempting to trim the fat from bloated federal agencies.

As expected, the media and bureaucrats are outraged. But Elon Musk is standing his ground. And frankly, he has a point.

Government waste is nothing new. Leaders have promised to rein it in for decades, yet spending keeps ballooning. Take, for example, some of the more ridiculous government-funded projects exposed by Senator Rand Paul. He highlighted a $118,000 study on finger snapping, inspired by the comic book villain Thanos. The conclusion? “Varying degrees of friction between the fingers alters performance of a snap.”

Really? That’s where our tax dollars are going?

Then there was the study on Neil Armstrong’s first words on the moon. Did he say, “One small step for man,” or “one small step for a man”? NASA already confirmed no “a” was audible, yet taxpayers funded a study that concluded, “Ambiguity exists.”

Meanwhile, $1.5 million was spent on researching how to make tomatoes taste better. The big breakthrough? Sugar helps. These are the kinds of frivolous expenditures that make people shake their heads while watching the national debt skyrocket.

But here’s the problem: even if Musk managed to cut all these absurd programs, it would barely make a dent in the deficit.

Where the Real Cuts Should Happen

If we’re serious about tackling spending, we have to go bigger. Chris Edwards, editor at the Cato Institute’s “Downsizing Government” project, suggests slashing over a trillion dollars in subsidies to state and local governments. This includes funding for K-12 education, school lunches, and food stamps.

Of course, cutting food stamps sounds harsh, but Edwards points out that taxpayers are footing the bill for junk food: “Taxpayers fund candy and cake,” he says. And when states try to ban junk food from welfare programs, they aren’t allowed to. That’s right—Washington won’t even let states set their own standards.

Then there’s corporate welfare. The federal government hands out $180 billion a year in subsidies to corporations, yet the average American sees no real benefit.

And let’s talk about government-owned assets. The federal government holds an astonishing 300,000 buildings—many of them sitting empty, costing taxpayers millions in upkeep. Yet, instead of selling them, politicians cling to these properties while buying even more land.

“We don’t know the market value,” Edwards notes. “It is in the trillions.” Instead of leveraging these assets, the government just prints more money, worsening inflation.

Will Trump Make a Difference?

Donald Trump says he’s ready to make serious budget cuts this time around. He’s already moved to eliminate DEI programs, telling federal DEI employees, “Don’t come in.” Yet, they’re still getting paid because, as Edwards points out, “It’s very difficult to fire federal workers.”

Even if Trump found a way to cut every federal employee, it still wouldn’t be enough to erase the deficit. The biggest costs—defense, Medicare, and Social Security—remain untouched. And so far, Trump has said he won’t touch them.

“Trump does not have to solve the entire deficit problem in his four years in office,” Edwards says. “But he’s got to get the ball rolling.”

Growth, Not Just Cuts, Is the Answer

Balancing the budget would be ideal, but even slowing the growth of government spending could help. If the private sector thrives, economic expansion could help ease the debt burden.

But Washington’s obsession with regulations keeps holding businesses back. Musk shared one example of this regulatory overreach:

“SpaceX had to do a study to see if Starship would hit a shark,” he said. When that concern was dismissed, regulators raised a new one: “What about whales? If the rocket goes underwater, then explodes, and the whales have hearing damage?”

This is real bureaucracy at work—delaying progress over far-fetched hypotheticals.

If Musk has his way, he’ll push for fewer regulations and smarter spending. And if Washington is serious about America’s future, they’ll stop wasting time—and our money—on nonsense.

To fix the deficit, America needs to spend smarter and grow stronger. And that won’t happen without bold action.