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I was reading another blog the other day discussing how Federal workers are beginning to panic about their futures. "What will I do?", "How will I pay my bills?", "Where will my next paycheck come from?"

I can empathize - I've been there; I've even been a GS employee at times. And I've been laid off before.

Well, welcome to the real world.

It's a bit of a shock when someone comes to you with a termination notice: "Project's been cancelled, we need to cut costs".

Said message usually brought by someone who knows they won't be laid off and whose main job is terminating others when not shuffling papers.

Sometimes you might get two weeks notice; seems these days you're more likely to be walked out the door right then and there.

A certain complacency sets in when you're assured of not being fired. You might get re-assigned, but you do continue to get a paycheck.

You know who've been the most assured of not getting fired from government jobs? The support staff - secretaries, HR, accounting, legal. Those that do the work are often subject to project funding - and those who "support" the work are often the least likely to be let go. All too often - in my experience - these are the DEI hires, the "affirmative action" hires, those who have "rights" but little responsibility and even less accountability.

So, yes, I have empathy for these workers - I've been in that position and at best, it sucks. Then it goes downhill from there. Their cocoon is bursting and they now find themselves in the same position Biden put the oil pipeline workers in when he first took office. Other examples abound.

Welcome to the world of the private sector ...

What was the government's advice to the oil workers when the pipeline was shut down putting 11,000 people out of work?

"Learn to code" as I recall.

I wonder how much sympathy these same Fed workers had for those workers, knowing that their jobs were "guaranteed?

Biggest trouble in this country now is not enough jobs for too many people.

It's going to take a while to shift things back to production. There will be undeserved suffering.

And there's no way out in the short-term.

I'm in favor of tariffs on principle. While costs will go up in the short run, the nation will be better off if we return to being a "producer nation" as opposed to being a "consumer nation", i.e., welfare state. Make money real again, bring production back to this nation, decrease the actual unemployment numbers, not just those unemployment numbers based on those who collect government welfare. The number of people without livable work right now far exceeds the official numbers - our economy is in very bad shape.

It's largely a tax code and regulatory issue. Out-sourcing is a tax deductible expense (or was when I was in that game); employees are an expense of a different sort. What would happen if the cost of employees was a deduction from gross revenue? What would happen if "labor-saving" equipment was taxed at a rate proportional to the number of "laborers" it replaces?

Someone would figure out a way to pay off the legislators that we allow to make those decisions to benefit the few at the expense of the many
...

What would happen if there weren't so many regulations discouraging small start-up businesses?

What the country now needs - especially in light of the current state of the educated public - is more jobs for ditch-diggers and porters.

And fewer jobs for HR, "administrators", "administrative assistants", and the like.

Rant over ... and I didn't even really get started.

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Ghostsniper submitted this as a comment but it appears to be copyrighted material. I'll provide the (dead) link but it's best if I don't publish material not mine or any particular commenter's.

GOLDEN AGE THE AMERICAN RENAISSANCE by EKO
Feb 15, 2025

eko dot substack dot com/p/golden-age

Sorry ghostsniper - I trashed the comment but I thought it was worth letting people know where to go to read it.

As what's-his-name says: New Rule
Please don't submit copyrighted material that you don't own. I'll post a dead link to the material though.
Thanks

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To which I neither accept nor deny but which I present to simply stir the pot.

I see two possibilities - on the face of which, neither seems likely:
Mankind was "made" ... or mankind "just happened"

Could it be that "Eternal Life" is just another form of Hell?

The three religions of Abraham: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam
Jews: It never happened
Christians: Yes it did
Muslims: Yes it did, but it was our guy, not yours

“History records the tragic fact that men have gone to war and cut each other’s throats because they couldn’t agree as to what was to become of them after their throats were cut.”

Christianity: 30% of world - 2.4 billion (about 1.4b Catholic)
Islam: 2 billion
Judaism: 15 million

non-religious: 1.4 billion

Matthew 12
[34] Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword.
[35] For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the daughter in law against her mother in law.
[36] And a man’s foes shall be they of his own household.

I sometimes think all gods exist: they all sit in a cosmic tournament poker game, playing for souls.

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Most significant other (MSO) & I had a most unusual per-marriage relationship. I can't really say we "dated" in the usual American sense - although she claims we did a little. I never considered going out with a group of people a date, but she was a foreigner of a conservative culture so in her eyes, I guess we did.

But not for long.

I don't know what it was - I was in my early 40s and by some definitions, I'd been married twice before ... actually had recently broken it off with #2.

But the little voice inside my head told me to not hesitate; this woman was worth the full commitment - I knew it right away. Wasn't sure she did.

We were in Colorado. Being of vastly different religions - or the same one, depending on how "religion" is defined - and being as Colorado acknowledged common-law marriages, we got married in the eyes of the state.

Turns out the Feds don't recognize common-law when it comes to things like green cards and immigration processes.

So today is the day we went to the courthouse and got married for the Feds.

So today, Feb 13th, is one of our anniversaries. And it had nothing to do with Valentine's Day, it had to do with being Friday the 13th.

But we have three anniversaries.

Our family and friends wanted a "wedding", so a few months later at a nicer time of year, a friend of ours, legally empowered to perform weddings, not that it was necessary, married us yet again in the "proper way" - in front of friends and family. A good time was had by all, music included "They're Coming To Take Me Away" (yes, ghostsniper, it'll be on Tunes For Tuesday someday), and I heard the food was excellent - I didn't get any. And everybody went home happy.

Especially me.

Our apartment was full of guests, including parents ... and that one friend that gets too drunk. I was with him when he tried to check into the hotel he and his wife reserved. They took his money then denied he paid - and refused him the room. So he and his wife also spent our wedding night with us.

MSO and I spent our wedding night sleeping on the floor with the other lessor beings; parent sets getting the two bedrooms.

But the anniversary we celebrate is the first one, the common-law marriage where we both committed to each other some 25 years or so ago.

And it seems to still be working out. Wouldn't trade what I have for anything.

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