Dear Editor,
I am intrigued by the use of the word “Extremism” in two letters to the editor in your newspaper last week. If you take a close look at our oversized Federal Government, you will hope for some extreme measures.
• The U.S. Department of Education has 4,400 employees spending $68 billion annually, interfering with the schools our counties and states should run.
• The U.S. Department of the Interior has 61,000 employees. What can they all be doing?
• The Department of Transportation has 58,000 employees and costs $271 billion.
• The U.S. Department of Justice has 115,000 employees, including the FBI, whose track record of harassing U.S. citizens is well documented.
• TheU.S. Department of Agriculture has85,000 employees.
We also need to consider three other facts when considering whether and how to improve this situation. First, none of these are elected positions; all these employees are appointed. Does anybody think cronyism may be running rampant in Washington, D.C.? Second, until the recent Supreme Court ruling in Colorado, these agencies have the power to regulate to meet their own wishes and defend their regulations with their own attorneys; the Supreme Court has reined them in with just cause. Third, the total of our Federal Government staffing has increased 55% since 2019 according to the White House Office of Management and Budget. How can anyone think there is not a need for extreme change in Washington?
Project 2025 proposes to claw back overreach by current and previous presidents. “Presidents should not issue mask or vaccine mandates, arbitrarily transfer student loan debt, or issue monarchical mandates of any sort,” the plan reads. “Legislatures make the laws in a republic, not executives.”
At the same time, the proposed platform eliminates or reduces several of these gloated federal agencies in terms of their power and cost. The proposal would restore parents’ rights vs. the current, radical gender ideology and reduce the impact of DEI thinking in government decisions.
As for the authors’ comments about Donald Trump, there is a mountain of evidence that he would be more effective in achieving the needed changes in Washington than Joe Biden has been or would be.
Gerry Giesler, Greensboro