Hello, and welcome back. I’ve been trapped in this column for three years now.
→ The Epstein Files: On Thursday afternoon, a group of conservative influencers emerged from the White House carrying binders. The front of the binders ominously read The Epstein Files: Phase 1. It would finally all be revealed. They posed for pictures, displaying the binders. A brave new day. A few hours passed as these students of history pored over the binders. And inside was Jeffrey Epstein’s publicly available contact list, which was published years ago and which you can buy on Amazon.
The House Judiciary Committee Republicans then put out a tweet announcing in all caps EPSTEIN FILES RELEASED, but the link led to Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up,” a funny troll known as “Rickrolling” someone. The entire government’s been taken over by media grifters with their binder photo shoots and teen boys posting pranks, and I am the old marm screaming into the abyss: It’s not funny! Everyone, sit down, finish your dinner, and stop kicking your sister. Epstein was a sex criminal—and also a murdered intelligence asset that we probably all needed in the field! There are actual victims here.
→ Whoops, Ebola: Elon Musk continues to floridly slash the budget, holding up random annoying Serbian DEI programs as great examples of silly flab, and apologizing nervously for also cutting into the bone sometimes.
We will make mistakes. We won’t be perfect. But when we make a mistake, we’ll fix it very quickly. So for example, with USAID, one of the things we accidentally canceled very briefly was Ebola prevention. I think we all want Ebola prevention. So we restored the Ebola prevention immediately.
Whoops, our national parks. Whoops, pediatric cancer funding. Whoops, research on how to teach kids to read. And actually, maybe Ebola funding is still canceled, double whoops. When Marco Rubio wanted AIDS prevention to remain funded, the DOGE boys decided actually, Marco, no, and rejected each little payment. They even cut a program that made food aid delivery less wasteful, which is just meta-level budget cutting: Slash programs designed to reduce waste. The philosophy is: Cut the spending, then correct it after people point out really loudly that we need Ebola prevention. Built into the philosophy of the program is that people need to complain and yell, “NOT EBOLA.” It’s like you have to specify if you want your car to come with airbags now, or else we’ll assume you don’t need those.
When faced with the challenge of modernizing the entire government, a machine that resists efficiency, resists modernity, and certainly resists transparency, I do get it on some level. The adjustment is going to be painful no matter what. Shock and awe are better. And I love smart people like Airbnb co-founder Joe Gebbia getting involved in fixing seemingly intractable problems. That’s great.
But the risks are also great. When the mothers of Elon’s many kids need his attention for something regarding the children, they must resort to posting at him. They usually preface by explaining that he has not responded to texts or calls, or he’s missed planned meetings. Eventually it seems to work; someone reaches out to them to settle whatever issue it is, and there’s silence again for a few months. Now that is all of us. America is an unwed Elon mother, excited for the adventure, committed to the project, but a little alarmed, a little emotional, hoping to get his attention because, all jokes aside, there is no running water and so much Ebola in the house, and like, Elon, are you there?