President Trump wants Musk to get more aggressive on DOGE cuts, to which Musk responded, “Will do, Mr. President.” Justifiably, Musk doesn’t see that same kind of “will do” spirit in the federal bureaucracy, and has demanded federal employees email him a simple list of their accomplishments from the last week.

That’s still not aggressive enough, as the assignment will take less than five minutes to accomplish -- once they disavow their haughty hubris. In the private workforce, status reports are commonplace, but not perfunctory; they take longer because, unlike the union-dominated fed government workforce, employees must justify their salaries. Many do so proudly and gratefully.

Another reason Musk is still not being aggressive enough, per Trump’s wishes, is that he’s dangling the prospect of promotion to those who give “good responses.” Umm, that’s pussyfooting around, at least when contrasted to when he was prancing around with his DOGE chainsaw at CPAC.

If fed government workers are anything like some state workers I’ve experienced, trust me: hardly anyone is overqualified for their current job, or deserving a promotion. Rather, their supercilious bosses, perhaps attempting to instill loyalty (while making themselves look more important), promote them beyond their talents. The Peter Principle is alive and well, so they certainly don’t need to be promoted for completing a simple five minute task.

So how can Musk be more aggressive with the namby-pambies in federal government (yes, some are worthy and essential, but the 80/20 rule prevails)? He doesn’t need an influx of emails that, even with the help of AI bots, may create bottlenecks. Rather, have the email administrators query their logs. It’s easy-peasy to create reports that show user activity, including login times and IP addresses.

That’s just dealing with email. More broadly, IT network operations should (one never knows with the government) be able to track user activity… or lack thereof. I know Musk has a bunch of IT nerds at his disposal. Wouldn’t an IT network operations report detailing when and how users are utilizing the network be more streamlined than combing through thousands of emails for “good responses”?

Overall, Musk is doing a great job with DOGE, but his lack of appropriate aggression toward the fed workers is also evident in his almost apologetic justification in saying the federal worker email is designed to spot fraud. Fraud is serious business, but I don’t think he needs to justify himself, and, by extension, President Trump.

Email administrators and IT network administrators can ascertain quickly if someone dares collect a salary without working (if that work requires a network device, of course). It should be traceable when someone logs into the system in the morning, perhaps even sending an annoying “Happy Monday email,” but then remains dormant while lounging around at home.

Furthermore, I believe it’s a simple configuration setting to disable a user logon if they don’t login for some predetermined time. If their “holiday” status is false, that should be one -- one -- day (perhaps two, max, if in a travel status). Then, send the report to the busybodies in HR so they can do some proper work instead of inflaming tensions with disruptive, morale-sapping DEI directives.

The fact that more DOGE aggression is required to discipline the federal worker workforce is evident in their pathetic, child-like whining. AFGE union bosses (perhaps afraid of losing dues) are so out of touch they described Musk’s assiduous attention to Trump’s DOGE directive as “cruel.” They are weenies who doth protest too much, so give them something to cry about -- pink slips.

Image: AT via Magic Studio