After having already lived through a Trump presidency, Americans who aren’t hopelessly insane should recall a pattern: Donald Trump does something of little or no discernible consequence to your day-to-day life and the media react by screaming about the “chaos.” Yeah, that hasn’t changed.
Headlines spanning from Tuesday to Wednesday this week include:
“Trump Freezes Trillions. Chaos Ensues.” — New York Times
“Federal judge blocks Trump federal spending freeze after a day of chaos” — Washington Post
“Trump aid freeze stirs chaos before it is blocked in court” — Reuters
“Trump’s spending freeze spreads chaos across US” — Politico
I’m confident that precisely zero people reading this right now lost a moment’s sleep as a result of Trump directing federal agencies to pause spending and produce reports detailing the projects and services they’re paying for. A few of you might have never slept better.
To the extent there was any disturbance from the orders at all, it arose because the news media apparently didn’t read the memo summarizing them. Reporters in Washington asked over and over again on cable news and at the White House press briefing on Tuesday whether programs like Social Security, Medicare, and food assistance would be affected. The directive in fact stated, “Nothing in this memo should be construed to impact Medicare or Social Security benefits.” It also said more broadly that the temporary pause on “Federal financial assistance” excludes “assistance provided directly to individuals.”
There are of course many people leading federal agencies who are either unwilling or incapable of doing anything that deviates from simply green-lighting the flow of taxpayer dollars no matter where it’s going, so there were reports of agencies left unsure of how the guidance applied to them. But that’s not chaos. That’s called change.
It turns out that this new administration is doing the unusual and taking an interest in what exactly the infinite number of federal agencies are doing all day. What are they spending money on and is any of it unnecessary? Duh, that’s why they were told to account for it so that some of it — hopefully a lot of it — can be targeted for cuts.
In any event, a federal judge in Washington put a pause on the pause, ruling that more time was needed to determine whether the spending freeze might inflict “irreparable harm.” (We could only hope.) And on Wednesday, the administration rescinded the memo altogether, perhaps to simply reissue a more detailed version that can be understood thoroughly by the ever-useful government workers. Either way, the fake panic over the fake chaos is sure to continue.
A bureaucrat being instructed to do something — a concept known outside of government as “work” — may make Washington and the media a little uncomfortable. That’s nice for a change, but it isn’t chaos for anyone else.
Jesus Christ is King
