There are about 24 million people working in local, state and federal governments. They comprise about 15% of the total workforce in the United States. Of those about 2 million are federal civilian employees. Active duty military are about 1.3 million people. To be sure, many government employees are hard working in essential jobs, but thousands of others are in functions of no value to the American people. Once a program is implemented, it is almost impossible to eliminate it. And no doubt, there is tremendous waste, fraud and abuse at all levels of government. In their wildest dreams, our Founding Fathers could never have imagined that in debating the workings of the Constitution, we would end up with a ruling class and a permanent bureaucracy this size as a threat to our freedoms.
Government employees, many of them represented by unions are self perpetuating. They are above all else in business to protect their interests and not the interests of the American people. We certainly see this today with Teacher Unions that are not focused on the interests of children. The bureaucracy functions independent of elected representative management and often in spite of it. Our Founding Fathers believed that the separation of powers at the federal level into three branches of government often replicated at the state level into the Executive, Legislative and Judiciary branches of government would act as a check and balance against tyranny and corruption. Clearly, it has not worked because in many cases we have a permanent ruling class and bureaucracy feeding at the trough to benefit themselves.
One critical omission from our US Constitution was term limits for both members of Congress and the Presidency. After Franklin Roosevelt was elected to four terms, a Constitutional Amendment was added to limit the President to two terms; but no such limit exists for members of Congress. The fact is the longer they stay in office the richer they get so they typically all leave office decades later as millionaires. And, we have seen the Deep State in action in recent years as crooks like the Clinton's, Biden's and many, many more are never brought to justice for their Pay to Play Schemes and or other obvious violations of the law. It just does not happen because it is the norm in the DC Swamp and many state capitals because so many would be implicated.
While there is good reason to admire and respect our military, particularly the soldiers on the front line, as Eisenhower warned there is the "military industrial complex" that feeds on wars and enemies whether real or contrived. The military brass benefits from wars, though death and disability are often the sad end result because it is the quickest road to promotion. And, the defense contractors earn billions of dollars every year maintaining old weapons and for new and improved weapon systems. Further, there is revolving door. When the generals retire, they often end up on the boards of these very same companies paying them millions of dollars who use them to buy influence within the military and government to keep the pork coming. The military has been very smart putting bases in nearly every state making it impossible for members of Congress to cut them given their impact on local economies.
Finally, the 100 largest companies in the US that control 50% of our GDP are highly vested in a big, bloated, corrupt government because as members of the Deep State Club, they are more than happy to put out millions of dollars in campaign contributions every year, which are essentially bribes to earn billions of dollars from government contracts. They supported Joe Biden and hated Trump because they knew they could not control Trump and they already own Biden because he is a long time crook. The system that has evolved is rotten to the core. One dirty hand washes the other.
We have seen with Covid that government at all levels is dangerous to our freedoms; but this threat to our freedoms has been happening for decades. The bigger government gets, the less freedom we have. Government today intrudes into all aspects of life. They tax and regulate everything we do, eat, touch, own etc to feed the beast and themselves. And, it is not even enough so they borrow creating unstainable debt that one day will result in the collapse and dissolution of the United States. Our Founders began with the best of intentions; but unfortunately, the evil in men and women that they feared has prevailed. The Deep State just succeeded in ending the Trump Presidency by voter fraud because Trump was not a member of their "Club". Americans need to stand up to save our country and soon. The Socialists that appear to be gaining power will destroy the United States of America. We must never allow that to happen.
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