08-11-2019, 04:41 PM
A fair amount has been written about the U.S.D.A. moving to Kansas City, as Ag Sec. Sonny Purdue said, to save money on employment, rent, general costs, and to have researchers and workers closer to what they research and work with. After defending the move, he's since gone back to his usual behavior of not being in the news unless needed to defend some other stupid policy.
(As Governor of Georgia, when discussing why he wouldn't approve of Sunday liquor sales, the teetotaler informed us we should instead be in church on Sundays. He never responded to why places like Home Depot should then not be allowed to be open on Sundays.)
Most of the news coverage has not been positive. Staffers have been given a month to decide between career and their lives, many predictably chose not to move. This creates an instant "brain drain" and works to harm the agency intended to help rural America.
But all of that was just whistling in the wind, as critics couldn't really prove otherwise.
The other day, Trump's acting Chief of Sycophants helped the critics.
"In his keynote speech at the Republican Party’s black-tie-optional Silver Elephant Gala in South Carolina on Friday, Mulvaney seemed to celebrate the attrition at the agencies. “You’ve heard about ‘drain the swamp.’ What you probably haven’t heard is what we are actually doing. I don’t know if you saw the news the other day, but the USDA just tried to move, or did move, two offices out of Washington, D.C.," he said.
As the crowd clapped, Mulvaney continued: “Yes, you can applaud that one. That’s what we’ve been talking about doing. Guess what happened? Guess what happened? More than half the people quit.
“It’s nearly impossible to fire a federal worker,” Mulvaney said. “I know that because a lot of them work for me, and I’ve tried ... By simply saying to people, ‘You know what, we’re going to take you outside the bubble, outside the Beltway, outside this liberal haven of Washington, D.C., and move you out in the real part of the country,' and they quit — what a wonderful way to sort of streamline government, and do what we haven’t been able to do for a long time.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/science/2...port-says/
(As Governor of Georgia, when discussing why he wouldn't approve of Sunday liquor sales, the teetotaler informed us we should instead be in church on Sundays. He never responded to why places like Home Depot should then not be allowed to be open on Sundays.)
Most of the news coverage has not been positive. Staffers have been given a month to decide between career and their lives, many predictably chose not to move. This creates an instant "brain drain" and works to harm the agency intended to help rural America.
But all of that was just whistling in the wind, as critics couldn't really prove otherwise.
The other day, Trump's acting Chief of Sycophants helped the critics.
"In his keynote speech at the Republican Party’s black-tie-optional Silver Elephant Gala in South Carolina on Friday, Mulvaney seemed to celebrate the attrition at the agencies. “You’ve heard about ‘drain the swamp.’ What you probably haven’t heard is what we are actually doing. I don’t know if you saw the news the other day, but the USDA just tried to move, or did move, two offices out of Washington, D.C.," he said.
As the crowd clapped, Mulvaney continued: “Yes, you can applaud that one. That’s what we’ve been talking about doing. Guess what happened? Guess what happened? More than half the people quit.
“It’s nearly impossible to fire a federal worker,” Mulvaney said. “I know that because a lot of them work for me, and I’ve tried ... By simply saying to people, ‘You know what, we’re going to take you outside the bubble, outside the Beltway, outside this liberal haven of Washington, D.C., and move you out in the real part of the country,' and they quit — what a wonderful way to sort of streamline government, and do what we haven’t been able to do for a long time.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/science/2...port-says/