[Looking at history and our area’s unique political and religious attitudes.]
Three letter agencies. What are they? Various monikers are used including permanent bureaucracy, deep state, shadow government, and other more pejorative terms.
How did they come about? President Woodrow Wilson began the idea of a permanent government outside of the political apparatus. There are as many as 443 departments, agencies, bureaus, corporations, and commissions but I have found no consistent, definitive list. It seems no one knows. They are divided by authorization. Executive (Cabinet) departments may have sub groups.
Other agencies are authorized by Congress with congressional oversight. Inspectors Generals were tasked for oversight to investigate fraud, waste, and abuse. The first was installed in 1976, a very recent development in history.
Then came DOGE.
Musk with his six engineer-sleuths plus other techno-investigators have well shown that Inspector Generals were not inspecting and Congressional oversight has been lacking.
Who would have thought that elected politicians would come out in favor of waste and fraud, but that is the case.
Consequently, the DOGE team has been accused of being illegitimate and creating a Congressional Crisis.
Apparently those making the claim have not read the Constitution, lately.
You may want to get up to speed. It is an incredible, short document that spells out the details of government. Its seven concise articles are comprised of 4543 words including signatures. A typical typed page has about 700 words, so the entire country is directed by less than seven pages. It can be read in about half hour. Let’s review.
Article I, Section 1: All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.
Section 7: All Bills for raising Revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives; but the Senate may propose or concur with Amendments as on other Bills.
Section 8: The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States;
Section 9: Powers Denied Congress.
Section 10: Powers Denied to the States.
There is some fleshing out, but that is all that Congress may do. The President is even simpler, like the Judicial.
Article II, Section 1: The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America.
Section 2: The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States;
Section 3: He shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient;
Article III, Section 1: The judicial Power of the United States, shall be vested in one supreme Court, and in such inferior Courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish.
Section 2: The judicial Power shall extend to all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising under this Constitution, the Laws of the United States, and Treaties made, or which shall be made, under their Authority;
We are not attorneys, but historians who study and report on the record of the Founding Fathers and early influences.
The Constitution does not require attorneys or historians to read and understand. It is for the people.
Now to the Constitutional Crises question. Where do you find the authority for a bureaucracy? It is not there. The Supreme Court in Chevron curtailed the power of federal agencies on June 2024, with a 35-page opinion ruling against the bureaucracy interpretation of laws as “fundamentally flawed.”
Read again the above synopsis of the Constitution. Does Congress have the authority to oversee executive activity?
No, except to manage the purse. The President has the sole and total authority as the executive of the government.
Notice, many lawsuits have been brought against DOGE and the President in the process of reducing government employees and expenditures. After normal judicial deliberation, most cases, even by democrat appointed judges have ruled in favor of the Presidential actions and those of his DOGE organization. The President is the chief executive.
Bureaucracy essentially has no accountability. It is not a good look when politicians defend fraud and corruption.
The President is moving fast and pushing hard, since his constitutional attorneys, including the Speaker of the House, ascertain that the Constitution is with the President. What do the words say?
Think about it. History is normally written from traditional information that we ferret out of archives. Now we are challenged to keep up with history in the making. May God less America.